The just-ended election on 7 December 2020 was so peaceful that it was so ‘boring’.

Unlike previous elections where, as a journalist, I could not get off my laptop, this time around, there was very little to report in terms of electoral violence on the D-day.

However, the post-electoral violence leaves much to be desired.

The mandated constitutional body, which is the Electoral Commission (EC), after three days, declared the sitting President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) winner of the polls. 

The main opposition leader, Mr John Mahama of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and his party apparatchiks, say the election has been rigged.

The worry is that the NDC is not telling Ghanaians what they will do about it despite rejecting the results and resorting to numerous demonstrations.  

The only legitimate route for Mr Mahama and the NDC to proceed is to head to the Supreme Court to challenge Nana Akufo-Addo’s legitimacy with all the evidence they have, but it appears the NDC is afraid to do so.

Why? I hear people say the NDC is terrified to head to court because most of the Supreme Court Justices were appointed by President Akufo-Addo and, thus, will rule in favour of their appointer. 

Inasmuch as that is a legitimate concern, I don’t think our astute Justices are puppets of President Akufo-Addo. If the evidence before them is overwhelming to overturn the election results, so must it be.

My gut feeling is that the NDC is uncomfortable proceeding to court because the ball they threw against the wall in 2012, is beginning to bounce back at them hard and they have no goalkeeping gloves to parry it.

The tables have turned.

While the NPP argued that the 2012 election had been rigged in favour of Mr Mahama and the NDC, the NDC, then in power, accused the NPP, then in opposition, of being sore losers.

What followed was the famous 2012 election petition that took eight months to come to an end.

When the NPP threatened to challenge the 2012 election result in court, the General Secretary of the NDC, Mr Johnson Aseidu Nketia, retorted: “Any idiot can go to court”. 

Little did Mr Nketia, a.k.a General Mosquito know that his words would come back to haunt him and his party sometime in the future.

General Mosquito had stated that all the “frivolous” allegations against the NDC and the EC by leadership of the NPP at the time, were borne out of frustration from their electoral defeat.

He noted that the NPP had itself to blame for not being vigilant at the polling stations where, according to the Chairman of the EC at the time, Dr Kwadwo Afari Gyan, elections were won.

When you throw a ball against a wall, it bounces back at you.

Today, the tables have turned. The NDC is rather accusing the EC of rigging the election for Nana Akufo-Addo and the NPP. 

They have no choice but to go to court if they want to challenge the electoral results but those infamous words of Aseidu Nketia: ‘Any idiot can go to court’, seems to be staring them in the face, preventing them from taking the only legitimate action they have before them.

When you throw a ball against a wall, it does, indeed, bounce back at you.

Again, ahead of the 2012 election, the NPP, led by then-candidate Akufo-Addo, had several reservations against the EC led by the beautiful Madam Charlotte Osei, appointed by Mr Mahama, the then-President. 

In response, Mr Mahama accused the NPP of embarking on a campaign to discredit the EC, as a ploy to reject the outcome of the elections if they do not win.

Mr Mahama, who said this at the launch of his party’s campaign for the 2016 polls at Cape Coast in the Central Region, stated that Ghana’s EC remains credible on the continent, and has been resourced to deliver a free and fair election.

“Lately, it has become fashionable for the largest opposition party to discredit the EC. All kinds of accusations including unprintable insults hurled at the person of the EC Chair have become normal. This is unacceptable. But for students of politics, we can see the strategy behind it. It’s an old trick in the book; vilify the referee and reduce his credibility in the eyes of the public when you can tell you are losing the match. This creates the platform where when you lose, you contest the outcome of the match, and this is the underlying force for all the winding that is taking place against the EC at every step of the electoral process. And yet with the same EC, the same voters’ register and process, the same party has participated in two by-elections and won; and this is indeed a paradox.”

“Our EC has a proud history of delivering credible elections in Ghana and has been used as a facilitator and resource person to transfer Ghana’s experience to other countries. Our electoral process has safeguards that allow us to police the elections from the polling station level to the declaration of results. Policing the poll and ensuring the integrity of the ballot, is as much the responsibility of the EC, as it is for us political parties. As President, I will ensure the Commission has all the support it needs to carry out its mandate,” he added.

Mr Mahama, if I may ask: What has changed? These were your words in 2012. 

Do you see that when you throw a ball against a wall, it bounces back at you?

Eight years after praising Ghana’s EC as the most credible on the continent, Mr Mahama, while announcing that he would not accept the result of any flawed election at a press conference on Thursday, 24 September 2020, described the EC, which had supervised an election he won in 2012, as incompetent.

“But, let me serve notice once again that we’ll not accept results of a flawed election”, Mr Mahama warned.

“We will certainly not look on, neither will we shirk our civic responsibility and allow the EC, whether by ill intent or sheer incompetence, to usurp the people’s mandate in the December 7 polls.

“The EC must take immediate steps to rectify and sanitise the register and re-exhibit it, to afford the voting public and all stakeholders, an opportunity to verify their particulars in the voter register before it is finalised”, he said.

When Mr Mahama and the NDC were discrediting the EC, were they preparing the grounds to reject the election results when it does not go in their favour as he told the NPP and Mr Akufo-Addo ahead of the 2012 polls?

When you throw a ball against the wall, it bounces back at you.

As a nation, why do we do this to ourselves?

Political leaders appear comfortable with every state institution and deem them to be independent and competent when they are in power but as soon as they are in opposition, they bastardise these same institutions they once defended.

To the Ghanaian politician, the grass is only greener if only they are in power.

The result of this 2020 election and the brouhaha associated with it should be a lesson to every political party, leader, and Ghanaian that what you do unto others shall be done unto you too.

Because when you throw a ball against a wall, it bounces back to you.