By Oblitey Commey

Let us rise up and respectfully touch glasses in honour of Senator John McCain for this sterling display of uplifting bravery and grandstanding statesmanship mired in gold.

For a man who at the politically terminal age of 76 ceding the White House to a Blackman for the first time, his second loss on the trot, for the historic voter turn out of 80%, and a two year campaign costing $700m in a bruising dogfight to the deadly finish, Senator John McCain had the motivation to slip into self pity and vindictiveness and conjure up vitriolic animosity within the American body politic to pull down the whole house with him. If he cannot have it, nobody else should, could have been his internecine and destructive axe head.

Post electoral violence as such are always fomented by disgruntled losers. But this loser showed a rare touch of grace in immediately conceding defeat before the battle was over and calling on his followers to support the winner, Barak Obama.

Were you not touched and impressed with the man pouring his heart out ex tempore without hiccup, cough or stutter taking all the blame for their historic electoral defeat, thanking all sincerely for supporting him through thick and thin and urging them to now direct their allegiance to the winner for the sake of their country? That speech was a treatise to all the world about how to lose victoriously.

If a political dogfight was not a matter of the winner takes all business, he had earned the right to share the lap of honour with Barak Obama.

That on the night, the victory belonged to Barak Obama cannot be compromised or overlooked. A Blackman in the White House was a dream come true for the founding fathers of the Black State in America. It was a well deserved event that drew in excitement and sympathies from all over the world from peoples and nations who understood the significance of the event.

It invoked memories of the death of Lady Diana when all who heard of her tragic passing felt they knew her although they had never met her. McCain’s magnanimous concession summoned a similar spontaneous global passion. Patriotism and statesmanship can go that far. Development and progress are not only found in material artifacts but in the quality and value of the human being and he gave that standpoint full expression.

Passive aggression as an assault on a notorious political establishment, stooping to conquer, sublime victory from a suppressive defeat and singing around the Walls of Jericho as a weapon of warfare have their icons in contemporary history.

In the theatre of making cognitive political statements non violently, no one epitomizes that more than revered Nelson Mandela in modern times, may he live to be over 100 years. He grew up to meet a system in the Republic of South Africa where the minority whites were not just rulers but demagogues over the majority blacks in a system of loathsome and dehumanizing separate development called apartheid.

The system was condoned and propped up by Western powers who are the bastions of democracy on this earth for the pedestrian reason of benefiting from the extensive natural resources of that country. The murderous oppressive tentacles of the system were second only to or equal in most respects to the inhuman treatment and extermination of the Jews during World War 11.

Internal dissent and opposition in that country was brought down with unfettered draconian force with its attendant loss of life and shedding of blood. Against this intimidating political environment, Nelson Mandela and a few likeminded souls sought to sit down with the white oppressors and negotiate a transition to majority rule. The system could not accommodate him and he was promptly imprisoned for a quarter of a century.

During the period, all kinds of pressures were applied to have him released while he himself languished in solitary confinement and physical and mental torture. He eventually won his case in the court of international opinion without deferring to any court of legal jurisdiction. Passive aggression had won the day.

He sublimely won a major victory to provoke an overhaul of the political establishment at the cost of his physical liberties and human freedom. He came out of jail when his physical fitness was literally fully drained from him but his history and bearing more than spoke eloquently for him and endows him now with the red carpet treatment on every international stage. There is no crown without a cross.

Predating the revered Oldman in achieving political objectives through non violent means in the same geographical theatre of the Republic of South Africa was another nationalist and lawyer, Mahatma Ghandi. The British are not known for surrendering political autonomy to any of their colonies on a silver platter.

They will resist any agitation to force them out with as much force as they can command never mind the cost in human lives. Working in South Africa Ghandhi could not accept his status as a second class citizen of that country and returned to India where he joined the clamour for independence.

His combative philosophies consisted of the non violent teachings of Jesus Christ and Leo Tolstoy. He was arrested beaten, tortured and detained several times for daring to raise a finger against the maltreatment of Indians in South Africa. All he had as his weapon were those nightmarish dread of dictators- a strong mind to fight for what they believed in and a huge outpouring into the streets.

Ghandhi introduced the fasting option and a severe treatment of his body into the portfolio. Without any physical weapons, waves and waves of street protests discomfited the colonizers as it led governance to teeter on the brinks of disorder. Surely the administrators had to take notice in spite of the loss of lives. Quality leadership pays a price for its incubation and training.

Negotiation, persuasion and consensus building are not a strong part of the African spirit. The African personality is a warlike one and this is exemplified in almost all the cultures throughout the continent. Sharing power, resources and tolerating the alternative opinion are foreign to the African karma.

It is seen as a sign of weakness if the custodian of people’s power cannot get up and just about do anything he likes. With us the king or the local chief takes all. Until he dies he is the be all and end all and his position and that of his assigns are never up for contest or renewal.

Commonwealth resources are personal to him in absolute terms and he is accountable to no one. That is why in Africa we can have national leaders who are richer than the state in billion dollar terms while their subjects wallow in abject and pitiful poverty. The likes of Mobutu Sese Seko, Sani Abacha, Houphet Boigny, Emperor Bokasa, General Eyadema and lately Robert Mugabe spring instantly to mind.

With us access to political authority is tantamount to material prosperity and that premise must be defended to the resolute core. If an European or American professional is appointed to political office perhaps he may not need more than a few cosmetic changes to ensure his security.

He will probably still remain in his house and everything else will be business as usual. Here the celebration will continue for months on end drawing in members of both the close and extended families. Political elevation facilitates survival above the ordinary rung perhaps for eternity.

However, there is only one threat to this eternal bliss—an election where the oppressed and exploited can deliver their judgement with a change of government in view. In the post colonial era, independence blew as a wind over the continent. It was followed by several coups and other forms of violent change overs. Now it is democratic elections with first time winners constitutionally perpetuating themselves in power.

A clean, free fair and transparent election is the vocal boogie-woogie of the average African presidential aspirant. A repeated credible election will run counter to the innate political longevity of the aspirant and therefore must be attacked and scuppered. Campaigning for public office is a very expensive and daunting enterprise in Africa.

A man will feel justifiably short changed and cheated if after all this he is convinced that the peoples’ voices or decisions have been vandalized. At this point he must decide whether he must be a statesman or a politician.

The statesman or patriot will seek to preserve the viability and integrity of the state by letting it all be or he will campaign for non violent reforms through public agitation. The politician will on the other hand not give one quarter. He will go for his due no matter what.

Making that case sufficiently has led to destabilization of many countries on the continent. Name them: Kenya, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Togo, DR Congo, Ivory Coast, Mauritania, Chad, Somalia, Sudan etc.

Acknowledging defeat as graciously as Senator McCain did is predicated on a belief in the credibility of the electoral system. If there is a perception that the process is tainted or corrupted, then a non violent concession is a difficult option to embrace.

Bidders for political power in this election must declare here and now who they are. Are they politicians out to claim their pound of flesh or will they be statesmen acknowledging all the imperfections in the system and acquiescing for now while we inch towards baseline credibility? Ghana is a precious commodity that deserves the Senator John McCain template.

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