Controversial bookmaker Paddy Power has drawn up a list of contenders to replace Benedict and one of the touted favourite to replace the Pope in the Vatican City is the Ghanaian Cardinal, Peter Appiah Turkson.
Paddy Power is an Irish bookmaker and is known for its controversial advertising campaigns and betting markets and it seems many analysts believe in the ranking judging from the background that the new Pope will be a Blackman for the first time in history.
With the sudden announcement of Pope Benedict’s resignation on Monday as a result of what he describe as old age and health issues, Ghanaians are highly happy with this prediction from Paddy Power and are hoping the Ghanaian will be appointed.
Cardinal Appiah Turkson is currently the president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace a position given to him by the late Pope John Paul II in 2003.
Biography of Cardinal Appiah Turkson
Cardinal Peter Turkson, a Ghanaian, is president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. He has been considered ‘papabile’ since he was appointed to this post by Benedict XVI in 2009 amid speculation that the next pope would probably be from Africa as part of the Catholic church’s attempts to modernise and reach out to a huge Catholic congregation from the Sahel southwards.
Peter Turkson was born in western Ghana to a Methodist mother and Catholic father. As a boy in the seminary he was considered far too boisterous to be content in a contemplative, solemn career in the church.
But he was reportedly begged by his mother to knuckle down and study hard to become a priest, and he did so well he was chosen to move to the US to study at St Anthony-on-Hudson Seminary in Rensselaer, New York, and he was ordained as a priest in 1975.
Returning to Ghana, he became a professor at St Teresa’s Seminary, near where he grew up, and dedicated himself to academia as well as performing pastoral work in the local area.
In 1992 he was appointed Archbishop of Cape Coast by Pope John Paul II and served as president of the Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference from 1997 to 2005.
It was during this time, in 2003, when Pope John Paul made him the first ever Ghanaian cardinal and his influence was extended by Pope Benedict XVI, who appointed him president of the Ponitifical Council for Justice and Peace, a role which sent him around the world mediating in countries such as the Ivory Coast in 2011.
In October of that year he called for the establishment of a ‘global public authority’ and a ‘central world bank’ and has come out in favour of a Robin Hood-style tax on large financial transactions. When he visited Britain with Pope Benedict in 2010 he was singled out as a possible successor.
According to the Bookmakers Paddy Power the favourite is Cardinal Peter Turkson of Ghana (9/4), with Cardinal Marc Ouellet next at 5/2 and Francis Arinze at 7/2.
Below is full list of cardinals the conclave would choose from according to Paddy Power‘s ranking
9/4 Cardinal Peter Turkson (Ghana)
5/2 Cardinal Marc Ouellet
7/2 Cardinal Francis Arinze
7/1 Archbishop Angelo Scola
10/1 Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga
12/1 Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone
14/1 Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco
16/1 Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio
20/1 Cardinal Leonardo Sandri
25/1 Cardinal Raymond Burke
25/1 Cardinal Cladio Hummes
25/1 Cardinal Dionigi Tettamanzi
25/1 Cardinal Christoph von Schonborn
33/1 Cardinal Wilfrid Napier
33/1 Cardinal William Levada
33/1 Cardinal Camillo Ruini
33/1 Cardinal Norberto Rivera Carrera
33/1 Cardinal Francisco Javier Errazuriz Ossa
33/1 Cardinal Renato Martino
33/1 Cardinal Albert Malcolm Ranjith
33/1 Archbishop Piero Marini
33/1 Cardinal Antonio Canizares Llovera
33/1 Cardinal Keith O’Brien
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