A new twist to the petrol price saga: I asked Grandma what she thought on the matter, since she voted NDC and has usually come down on their side, unlike the people I work with. She says that while the NDC’s move was discouraging for morale for its supporters, it is not necessarily far off what they promised. According to her, during campaign season petrol was extremely expensive, and once the NDC promised to reduce the price the NPP went ahead and did just that, cutting it by around half, so that the NDC could not use it as an issue. So increasing the price now by 30% is not putting it at the same level as before. This is my insight from her, although I have not seen prices over time to confirm it. I would not be shocked if she is right though.
A couple big stories today were interesting and the Deputy Editor Bennett was talking about them with me in a rare decision to speak English at the office (thus allowing me to enter the conversation without being obnoxious). The president’s spokesman on Friday was caught buying subsidized farm equipment, which is being sold at 10,000 cedis per tractor (as a down payment, plus 8,000 on an installment plan) to underprivileged farmers in the country. The man has no farm and is certainly not underprivileged, so this was quite a controversy. However, Saturday night someone in the ministry of agriculture leaked the receipt to Bennett (more on that in a second), and it turns out that not only is he getting this tractor plus other equipment when he shouldn’t be, he also only paid 1,000 cedis for it – 10% of what he was supposed to put down. Super big story coming out of the NDC, since it’s supposed to be the squeaky clean party.
Interesting bit about the leak: Bennett has a contact at Agric through whom he got the leak. The actual leaker’s identity is unknown, although the document looked pretty good (it was stamped with the minister’s seal and all that jazz). It seems like leaks are not a daily occurrence, but they are fairly frequent, and the Guide has a number of contacts like this around the bureaucracy. It sounds like most of them are only on deep background though, and their identities aren’t always known. This seems to me to be a bit problematic if they are regularly getting tips like this, since it’s a no-no to have people able to accuse each other anonymously. But for real leaks, it’s good that there is protection for whistleblowers through anonymity, which is not true in every African country – so it’s a trade-off. Also, apparently the leaks frequently come from dissenting factions of the ruling party (whichever it may be), so often the paper is used to serve the role of exposing “enemy” party members. Pretty typical of media everywhere, I think, and ultimately pretty healthy for democracy since everyone should be afraid of screwing up.
The other big news item today was the state seizure of a former MP’s car while she was at church on Sunday. I think I have mentioned before that the NDC has been trying to impound government cars that were taken by MPs and ministers who did not retain their seats after the election. According to Bennett and the paper today, this particular minister purchased her car after using it officially for 4 or 6 years or however many, which is standard practice. I’m not positive any of our reporters actually saw the purchase documents, but they seemed pretty convinced she had them. Regardless, the point Bennett makes is still pretty good – whenever something comes out against the NDC, they tend to deflect media attention by seizing a car or something like that (in this instance, the spokesman and the tractor were the embarrassing story to be covered up). It mostly worked, too. The car seizure headline and picture were the prominent part of the front page, with the tractor story a somewhat smaller headline with no art.
An unsubstantiated rumor: Bennett thinks the NDC has been seizing cars and hiding surveillance equipment in them to record the goings on/ movements/ conversations of these NPP rivals. He said no such equipment had been found in any car yet, although he claims that there are people in the NDC (or at least in the government) who have told him that’s what’s happening. It’s not a substantiated-enough story yet to go to print, though, as far as I know.
My ride home was pretty interesting. I was waiting for the bus and said hi to the guy next to me (cuz that’s what you do), and he very out of the blue asked me if I spoke French. I don’t know what the percentage is of white folks in Ghana that speak French, but I’m sure it’s pretty small. For whatever reason, he and his fried happened upon one who did. So Roger, Valex, and I had a nice chat on the way back. They are both students from Côte d’Ivoire. It’s funny how much better I can communicate with francophone Africans than with most English-speaking Ghanaians. So I’ll probably be hanging out with them later (at least Roger – I think Valex is leaving tomorrow), which is cool because they were fun guys and I need some French practice anyway.
Once the got off I spoke with the guy next to me, who it turns out is a radio presenter for Rock FM called Otumfuo Nana. I had a little more trouble understanding him, since he was speaking English, but we had a nice chat and he said he would take me to his station, which I think would be quite cool.
So Katey will definitely be staying with me starting Thursday, which should be fun. I just need to make sure my stuff is off the extra bed : / Sorry for the mess in advance, Katey!
Back to parliament tomorrow I hope!
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