Are we really 57?
Last Thursday, March 6, marked the 57th anniversary of Ghana’s independence from British colonial rule. As usual, celebrations went on throughout the country with the security services, pupils and students marching in towns and cities.
Advertisement
Ghana, before March 6, 1957, was known as the Gold Coast. History has it that the Portuguese were the first Europeans who came to the country in the 15th century, and having found so much gold between the rivers Ankobra and Volta, named the place Mina (Mine in English). In 1481, King John II of Portugal sent Diego d'Azambuja to the Mina who, a year later in 1482, built the Elmina Castle to ease their trade in gold, ivory and slaves.
In 1598, the Dutch also arrived in the country and later built forts at Komenda and Kormantse. They eventually captured the Elmina Castle from the Portuguese in 1637, and followed up to capture another castle at Axim (Fort St Anthony) from them in 1642.
From the mid-18th century, the exploits of the Portuguese and the Dutch attracted other Europeans like the English, Danes (Denmark) and Swedes (Sweden) who also built castles and forts along the coast of the country. By late 19th century, only the Dutch and the English were left on the shores of the country, but the Dutch also left in 1874, enabling England to make the country a crown colony and adopting the name the Gold Coast.
Following a series of wars between the British and the Asantes, and the Asantes and other local kingdoms, the English sought a collaboration with the Fantes leading to the signing of the Bond of 1844, which enabled the British to provide an extended ‘protection’ to the Fantes and the latter groups who signed the bond.
If one considers the formal relationship of the British with the Gold Coast from 1844, then it means the British ruled the country for 113 years before independence was gained on March 6, 1957.
So one could ask what we have made of ourselves 57 years after becoming independent. Perhaps our greatest achievement was in the perfection of coups d’état, which to a greater extent have been the cause of the country’s stunted growth. Until January 7, 1993, when constitutional democratic governance was restored for the fourth time in the country’s history, the military had ruled the country for a total of 21 out of the 35 post-independence years, with Jerry John Rawlings alone taking 11 solid wasted years.
And since 1993, we have clouded our thinking and national behaviour with bitter divisive politics to the extent that despite the various sharp brains and experts the country has, we are still deceiving ourselves, tickling ourselves and loudly laughing that we have made achievements.
Other Trending Stories
As a country, we have produced distinguished international civil servants, including Mr Kofi Annan, who became the UN Secretary-General. Ghana has for many years given the world some experts in all endeavours of life.
We have produced top-class engineers, yet we are proudly wearing a dum-so dum-so crown. We import almost everything that we consume including toothpick from China, yet we are still championing the interests of our political parties instead of that of the nation.
Ghana at 57 has no national policy which indicates what we aspire to. In the US, after Barack Obama (a Democrat) became President, he left a key position as Defence Minister (Secretary) in the hands of Robert Gates, who occupied the same position under President George W. Bush (a Republican). In Ghana, it would be an abomination to see an NPP government appointing a known NDC member as defence minister and vice versa. But I believe Obama did that purely based on American national interest at the time. Does Ghana have a national interest that transcends political party interests? No!
We have been toiling with even our education in the name of politics to the extent that we continue to sacrifice the future of our children (you remember the NPP-NDC 3-4-3 SHS system?), thus sacrificing the future of the nation. As we continue to take pride in which political party has the best insulting activists instead of harnessing our human resources devoid of political party colours, only God knows when we will stop importing rice from the US, toilet rolls and toothpick from China, tomatoes from Burkina Faso and gari from Nigeria.
Today, we are wasting productive time discussing the copyright owner of free SHS while schools re-opened without even chalk for teachers to teach (you remember President Mahama said he had checked at the Registrar General’s Department and no one owned the free SHS copyright, haba!).
Legon lecturers and other staff have not been paid their salaries for February because government has not given the university its grant and we find nothing wrong with it. Many workers are just awaiting a whistle from their leaders to start industrial action and our MPs and the President have the luxury of using precious parliamentary time to engage in jokes ‘tweaaing’ themselves on the floor of parliament.
For God’s sake let us behave as fully grown ‘57-year-old persons’ and move this country forward. It was time we stopped patting ourselves with deceptive micro and macro-economic indicators and accepted that we have failed compared with countries like Malaysia and India. Let’s put on our thinking caps; we have the brains, the experts and the resources to move forward.
PS: Mr Inspector General of Police, the children and widow of Adjei Akpor (the 22-year-old man your men killed at Adenta on January 6, 2014) are still waiting for your response and justice.
The writer is a journalist and political scientist. He is the Head of the Department of Media and Communication Studies, Pentecost University College, Accra. fasado@hotmail.com
Source: Daily Graphic