President John Mahama Sunday revealed he was unwilling to be a politician as a result of his father’s traumatic experience after the government in which he served was overthrown.
Delivering remarks during service at the Cedar Mountain Chapel International, Assemblies of God, the president said his father’s distasteful experience took a toll on him.
The president’s father, Emmanuel Adama Mahama served as Member of Parliament and Northern Regional Minister during the Nkrumah administration.
After the 1966 coup d’etat which saw the National Liberation Council take power and depose the Convention People’s Party, the elder Mahama was locked up by the military, an experience President Mahama noted impacted him.
He said his father’s account of his mistreatment discouraged him from venturing into politics, however, God had decided it was the path for him.
“At every point, I have been reluctant to follow that trajectory. For instance, politics. I was reluctant to go into politics because my father had been in politics and there had been a coup d’etat, he was arrested, he was locked up for two years and after that, he was so traumatized that he never wanted anything to do with politics.”
He continued: “And so because of the narrations that he had given about the trauma he had suffered in prison, the setbacks he suffered as a result of his politics, my mind was ‘I will not be a politician’ but God said, “Who are you to decide? I will do with you what I want.” And the rest is history.”
President Mahama said after becoming deputy minister and substantive Minister of Communications during the Rawlings era, he had decided to retire when then Candidate John Atta Mills invited him to the National Democratic Congress presidential ticket ahead of the 2008 general elections.
In his monologue, he discussed the importance of prayer in Christian life, indicating that he intended to emulate Daniel in the Scriptures by praying three times daily.
The president said he was thankful that God had been his guide in his personal and political journey.
