Arthur Kennedy is a Pathological Liar

There is a basic syllogism that I walk my students through nearly every semester, when I teach them the most effective approaches to composing an argumentative essay. It goes like this: “I have no respect for pathological liars; Dr. Arthur Kennedy is a pathological liar; therefore, I have no respect for Dr. Arthur Kennedy.” Of course, a “pathological liar” is one who is so inextricably, incurably and routinely invested in mendacity that the boundary between dream and reality is practically inexistent.

Actually, the original syllogism in the textbook that I regularly use to teach College Composition uses the more broadly generalized variable of “human mortality.” However, since the subject of this particular discourse is the aforementioned aspirant for presidential candidature on the ticket of Ghana's ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), “we” have decided that operationalizing our subject's name, contextually, would be quite in order.

What is quite intriguing about his rejoinder to my previous article, titled “Don't Fool Yourself, Dr. Kennedy” (Statesman 8/20/07), is that while caustically accusing yours truly of being invidiously afflicted with patent “ill-will” and outright falsehood against him, Dr. Arthur Kennedy also, paradoxically, vindicates this writer by significantly noting that in the interview that he granted a Ghanaian Statesman reporter, while on a campaign tour of the Central Region, he, Dr. Kennedy, inadvertently misrepresented himself. What he had meant to say, claimed the former South Carolina, USA, physician, was that while he personally believed that there were no frontrunners among the aspirants for the NPP presidential nomination, among the ranks of the “aspiring new faces,” he, Dr. Kennedy, was the man to beat.

If so, then why would Dr. Kennedy blame Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., for retailing deliberate falsehood about the former, when our subject himself emphatically claims to have misrepresented himself to the Statesman reporter, to whom he granted his telephone interview? And on the preceding score, it is also significant to point out that unlike some of his competitors, Dr. Kennedy is at least honest enough not to blame the Statesman's reporter for misrepresenting his views. It also goes without saying that his capricious attempt to fault yours truly for his own faux-pas makes the man who would be president, at all costs, seem like a brat – a pampered and spoilt child, which, in all reality, he just well may be.

And here, also, it goes without saying that where yours truly comes from in Ghana, when one goofs by tripping oneself over a stone on the village promenade, or thoroughfare, one maturely and responsibly lifts oneself up, licks one's wounds, wisely studies the treacherous terrain for future protection, and then one moves right on like a man. Alas, the preceding mien, or temperament, appears to be rather alien or simply anathema to Dr. Kennedy.

It is also rather bizarre for somebody who goes by the unmistakably Anglo-Irish name of “Arthur Kennedy” – not to mention the fact that the rejoiner cannot correctly spell my name, for whatever reasons best known to himself – to be vehemently railing against his having been called to order by yours truly, vis-à-vis our subject's flagrant abuse of the English language. In his rejoinder, the South Carolina physician derides as “silly” the very idea of non-native English speakers quibbling over the quiddities of English grammar. How so, when the rejoiner is so desperate to become president of Ghana that he, reportedly, resigned his health administration job in the United States just this past February in order to actualize his dreams?

In other words, exactly in what communication medium does Dr. Kennedy intend to rule his proverbial roost? Fante-Twi? Indeed, it is this kind of cavalier linguistic temperament that promptly disqualifies the Asebu native from clinching the presidency. For the well-meaning Ghanaian voter only has to couple the foregoing evidently smug penchant for mediocrity, on the part of our subject of discourse, to arrive at the root-cause of the current virtual academic stasis in the country. But, perhaps, the South Carolina hospital administrator ought to be told, in plain language, that English is the “official language” of Ghana; and particularly the fact that while, indeed, we may be non-native speakers of the same, nothing, except abject inferiority complex, should prevent us from being able to critically think and write in it. Otherwise, how could we have produced the sterling likes of Ayi Kwei Armah, Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Ngugi wa Thiong'O and Bessie Head, among a host of other major African, Anglophone writers and thinkers? (In any case, what does the rejoiner mean by “Between he and I”? At least, I know something about the Royal Plural Pronoun “We,” which I regularly and appropriately use in my writings and speech).

What also quaintly intrigued yours truly was Dr. Kennedy's insufferably outrageous claim that he was the first Ghanaian (student?) to call for an inquest into the assassination of the three Supreme Court judges. What chutzpah! Unless, of course, the good Doctor presumes yours truly to have been born in 1993. And for those of our readers who might not be aware, I can vouch, without any fear of contradiction, that the first Ghanaian (student or private citizen) to call for an inquest into the PNDC government's assassination of the Supreme Court judges was Mr. Kobina Asiedu-Aboagye, a fellow poet, and then-President of the Ghana Law Students' Association. And be it further known that Mr. Kobina Asiedu-Aboagye issued his courageous and conscientious call on GBC-2 on a program, hosted by Mr. Godwin Avernogbo, called “GBC-2 Fan Club.” And to be certain, the very first demonstrations to hit the principal streets of Accra were also spearheaded by Mr. Asiedu-Aboagye and the students of the Ghana Law School. And so, Dr. Kennedy, who is the liar here?

And since Dr. Kennedy also claims to have been a “brave student leader” in the wake of the assassination of the three Supreme Court judges and the retired Army officer, let me tell our readers exactly what the Legon student leaders championed in the wake of Mr. Rawlings' two bloody putsches: “Let The Blood Flow!” Many of these students also left school in order to join the AFRC-PNDC operatives to harass, persecute and murder “bourgeois” Ghanaian entrepreneurs!
I know the preceding, because I was that tiny, lone Prempeh College sixth-former, among the university students, who had been invited by the administrators of the Ghana National Cultural Center (Anokyekrom), Kumasi, to regale the cocoa-carting students with my “revolutionary poetry.” I also directed traffic at Kejetia Roundabout and served as Health Coordinator for the National Youth Organizing Commission (formerly the National Youth Council). I was also an eyewitness to Osofo Asare's brutal murder and “cremation” at the Kejetia Roundabout. In sum, I am no passive bystander to postcolonial Ghanaian political history, having also authored commentary notes for “O”-Level English Literature students as a lower sixth-former.

Indeed, Dr. Kennedy's lies reminds yours truly of another NPP aspirant for the presidency who has been tooling around the country proudly claiming to be “The Vice-President” of the Bank of New York. What is significant to observe here is that while, indeed, the said dude is “A Vice-President” of the Bank of New York, his apparently vaulting ambition to become President of Ghana seems to have conveniently blinded him from telling potential Ghanaian voters the unalloyed truth, which is that there are at least 600 (Six-Hundred) “sectional vice-presidents” at the Bank of New York, of whom he is only one. Besides, there are also a handful of Ghanaians who are also “sectional vice-presidents” of the Bank of New York. So why have no Ghanaian journalists investigated this glaring fact? Maybe next year, the GJA ought to consider yours truly for its “Journalist of the Year” award. By the way, I was part of a team of student journalists from City College of the City University of New York that won three prestigious awards from the Columbia University School of Journalism, between 1987 and 1990.

And just what does Dr. Kennedy mean by: “As I hope to be the nominee, I cannot wish the Vice-President or any other aspirant success. However, I wish them well?” Does Dr. Kennedy really speak English, or he simply underestimates the intelligence of his Ghanaian audience and potential supporters? There is an Akan maxim which states: “W'amma woyonko anntwa nkron a, wonso wonntwa du,” loosely translated as: “If you begrudge your neighbor his/her due, you shall also be denied your due.” Countrymen and women, I rest my tongue, and then my case.

*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., teaches English and Journalism at Nassau Community College of the State University of New York, Garden City. He is the author of “Dr. J. B. Danquah: Architect of Modern Ghana” (iUniverse.com, 2005). E-mail: [email protected].
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