Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa and Kwakye Ofosu are serving as ministers in the Mahama government
They were young, vibrant, intelligent, and articulate. By virtue of the exuberance associated with their young age and status as appointees of the Mills and Mahama governments, they had the major media platforms at their mercy.
With force and verve, they defended their governments. If you came at the then government over any of its policies or scandals, you came at them too, and they would not let it slide.
To proponents of the government then and the National Democratic Congress, they were the brilliant, eloquent, and talented crop of young politicians who represented the future of the NDC as not just a party for the low-lives but a party of the intelligentsia.
To their opponents, however, they were the arrogant, sharp-tongued, intolerant, and vicious bunch who would not stop at anything to defend the interest of their government.
Ideally, one would assume that the biggest critic of those young NDC members who always marauded various media houses would be someone with allegiance to the NPP. However, their biggest critic was none other than the founder of the NDC, Jerry John Rawlings, whose disdain for them and their actions led to him coining the tag “Babies with sharp teeth” for them.
“Mr. President, fellow Ghanaians, it is said that we should not throw out the baby with the bath water, but what do we do when some of the babies in the tub are babies with hard teeth, biting and spewing some very horrible invectives? Should they not be lowered out with the dirty water? After all, one bad nut is all it takes to spoil the taste in your mouth.
“When we find ourselves at a wooden bridge with some planks rotten, do we wait to get new planks before removing the rotten ones, or do we remove the rotten ones immediately?”
The quote above was said by JJ Rawlings at a public event on August 30, 2012.
Even though the former president made mention of no name, it was believed and corroborated later by Professor Kwamena Ahwoi that the targets of Rawlings’s outbursts were Felix Kwakye Ofosu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, Kwadwo Twum Boafo, Nii Lante Vanderpuye, Peter Boamah Otokunor, among others.
The then young members of the party had become a nemesis for the founder as they countered him and forcefully rebutted his attacks against the then Atta Mills government and subsequently the Mahama government.
In his book, ‘Working with Rawlings,” Professor Kwamena Ahwoi detailed how they created the team to combat Rawlings and stop him from publicly attacking the Mills government.
“From our knowledge of President Rawlings, we knew that he could not stand being talked back to by people he considered his subordinates,” he indicated in the book. “This must have been due to his military background because in the military, the subordinate never talks back to his superior officer.”
“So what we decided was that any time President Rawlings attacked or insulted President Mills publicly, one of the young members of the party would take him on publicly, not with insults but with logic.
“It worked, and the strategy proved effective. Rawlings toned down on his public criticism of President Mills. Instead, he turned his anger on the young ‘boys and girls’ who were talking back at him whenever he spoke,” he wrote in his book.
Where are they now
As President John Dramani Mahama kicks off the second term of his presidency, the so-called babies with sharp teeth have become mature adults who are set to hold key positions in his government.
Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa is serving as Minister of Foreign Affairs, Felix Kwakye Ofosu is the Acting Spokesperson to the President, and Kwadwo Twum Boafo is the Chief Executive Officer of the Financial Intelligence Centre, a key institution in Ghana’s anti-money laundering mission.
The likes of Nii Lante Vanderpuye and Peter Boamah Otokunor are expected to play key roles, having missed out on ministerial roles.
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EK