ACCRA-(MaraviPost)-Malawi Constitutional Court decision to nullify May 21, 2019 polls on February 3, 2020 has attracted much applause from many prominent figures beyond the country including the former President of Ghana Dr Jerry Rawlings.
The ConCourt decision has restored citizens trust on judiciary which was deemed to corrupted.
Here is a message from Dr Rawlings to Malawians and Africa in general.
I have been following the elections case in Malawi. Once again, this tiny Southern African country has proved to the whole world that it is governed by rule of law.
A few minutes ago, the Court has nullified last years presidential elections.
You may argue with me that such similar nullification has occurred before in Kenya.
But I challenge that the Malawi case is unprecedented.There were bribery allegations.
The Judges stood for the truth and could not accept any money from any politician.
We are told that a sum of about US$20 million was offered to the Judges but they refused and decided to uphold the rule of law.
If that same money was given to some Ghanaian Judges, they would sold the whole country, including selling Ghanaians abroad.
But the Malawian Judges stood firm on the truth. I admire the Malawi Judiciary which stands for the truth.
As Ghanaians there is a lot we can learn from the Malawi experience.
Congratulations to the people of Malawi.
According to Encyclopaedia Britannica Jerry J. Rawlings, in full Jerry John Rawlings, (born June 22, 1947, Accra, Ghana), military and political leader in Ghana who twice (1979, 1981) overthrew the government and seized power. His second period of rule (1981–2001) afforded Ghana political stability and competent economic management.
Rawlings was the son of a Scottish father and a Ghanaian mother. He was educated at Achimoto College and the military academy at Teshie.
He was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Ghanaian air force in 1969 and became a flight lieutenant and expert pilot, skilled in aerobatics.
In June 1979 Rawlings and other junior officers led a successful military coup with the purported aim of purging the military and public life of widespread corruption.
He and his Armed Forces Revolutionary Council ruled for 112 days, during which time the former heads of state, Gen. Ignatius Kutu Acheampong and Lieut. Gen. Frederick W.K. Akuffo, were tried and executed. Rawlings then yielded power to a freely elected civilian president, Hilla Limann, who promptly retired Rawlings from the air force.
Rawlings continued to be a popular figure, however, and on Dec. 31, 1981, after two years of weak civilian rule during which Ghana’s economy continued to deteriorate, Rawlings overthrew Limann’s government, accusing it of leading the nation “down to total economic ruin.”
Rawlings established a Provisional National Defense Council as the new government and imprisoned Limann and some 200 other politicians.
“Peoples’ Defense Committees” were set up in neighbourhoods, as were workers’ councils to monitor production in factories.
When the failure of these and other populist measures had become clear by 1983, Rawlings reversed course and adopted conservative economic policies, including dropping subsidies and price controls in order to reduce inflation, privatizing many state-owned companies, and devaluing the currency in order to stimulate exports.
These free-market measures sharply revived Ghana’s economy, which by the early 1990s had one of the highest growth rates in Africa.
In 1992, in the first presidential elections held in Ghana since 1979, Rawlings was chosen as president.
He was reelected in 1996 and stepped down from the presidency in early 2001.
