Spio Pisses on Ahwoi

It is a season for political fire-power, as Dr Ekwow Spio-Garbrah returns the salvos shot at him on Tuesday by a National Democratic Congress (NDC) colleague, Ato Ahwoi, signaling what is set to be an abrasive give-and-take affair. With the battle drawn, Spio fired back, virtually saying that he was ready to piss on the government as suggested by Ato Ahwoi. Ahwoi, the power behind President Atta Mills, had said: �My NDC brother, if President Mills does not appoint you as a minister, please continue to piss in as many times as you want!� A spokesperson for Spio, reacting to the charges leveled against the former ambassador and Communications Minister in the previous NDC regime by Ato Ahwoi, denied that his boss gave birth to the �Mills is Sick campaign� during the 2006 presidential primaries of the party. He also asserted that Spio had showed loyalty and commitment to President Mills and his wife as well. Speaking in an exclusive interview with Daily Guide on behalf of his boss, whom he said was in his London-based Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation (CTO) office, Spio�s man rebutted the charges, saying that Prof John Evans Atta Mills� health issue was first raised in the Daily Graphic of June 1, 2006 and not by Spio. He said the health issue which took the then candidate Mills to China and later to South Africa in the heat of the campaign, was given adequate explanation by the one-time law teacher when the subject hit the newsstands. According to him, following the issues raised about Mills� health at the time, he himself revealed that his sinusitis ailment took him to China where as a result of language barriers, he was compelled to turn to South Africa where he had a relation. Dr. Spio-Garbrah, he said, could not have been the originator of the disclosure as Mr Ahwoi sought to impress in his open and scathing letter of attack. The Spokesman frowned at the charge that Spio-Garbrah is egocentric, noting that it cannot be true, considering a number of developments following the NDC presidential primaries. Koku Anyidoho, now Communications Director of the President at the Castle, he recalled, had happily announced that Spio-Garbrah was joining the Mills campaign team when the Professor started his door-to-door campaign. He questioned the veracity of Ato Ahwoi�s attempt at rendering Spio irrelevant when indeed his joining the Mills campaign team was considered a blessing relished by the candidate�s minders. According to him, Ahwoi family cannot lay claim to contributing more than Spio to the fortunes of the NDC when it is evident that he was the man who stepped into the Prof�s shoes during the arduous campaign season in places such as Takoradi and Shama when out of fatigue, candidate Mills could not continue the campaign. �Where were the Ahwoi�s at the time?� he asked. He added that Spio played a vital role as Chairman of the Social Sector Committee in the Transition Team with 11 ministries under him, thereby showing total loyalty to Prof Mils. �There cannot be an iota of truth in the charges being leveled by Ato Ahwoi,� he added. Following the defeat of the NDC in 2000, Spio, he said, put adequate financial resources and mobilised others into the party and asked whether this wasn�t adequate show of commitment and loyalty to the party? He recalled how Spio rushed to the rescue of Mrs Naadu Mills when some cars in her custody were being taken away by officials of the National Security when Prof Mills was on sabbatical in Canada. Prof Mils, he said, out of respect for Spio�s show of loyalty and commitment, did announce in 2003 during his birthday bash that he would appoint the former Communications Minister the first Cabinet Minister in the event of an NDC victory in 2004. On the advice to Spio by Ato Ahwoi that he should rather consider sending queries and recommendations to the President directly and not through newspaper articles, the spokesman pointed out that many such correspondences have already been dispatched, but were not acknowledged by the Presidency. Mr Ato Ahwoi, a kingpin in the Fante power centre in the NDC, took issue with an abrasive open letter authored by Dr Spio-Garbrah a few days ago during the Kwame Nkrumah Centenary celebration. The no-love-lost relationship between the two has been aggravated by the publication in which the communications expect, Dr Spio-Garbrah, poured out his heart about what he considers major setbacks in the ruling NDC under the leadership of President John Evans Atta Mills. Mr Ahwoi accused Spio of releasing the �Mills is Sick� venom on the political terrain through a text message to party founder, Jerry Rawlings before the NDC presidential primaries. Mr Ato Ahwoi, protective of President Mills, asked his colleague to leave the President alone. He claimed that Spio was writing the letter out of frustration over his inability to make it in Mills� Cabinet. Mr Ato Ahwoi slammed the party door in Spio, stating that it would never be opened for him. According to him, having described Mills as a sick man, he could not turn round to seek consideration as a Cabinet Ministers, asking, �Howe can you work with a man you said could not win any elections?�