The Kotoka International Airport

What is in a name?

Rodney Nkrumah-Boateng Opinion Mar - 04 - 2025 , 09:57 5 minutes read

Thirty-nine years after his overthrow, Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah’s name continues to evoke quite some passions – perhaps a useful testimony to his greatness.

I have noticed on social media platforms that every year, three dates linked to Osagyefo seem to generate intensive debates between those who literally worship his memory and believe Ghana’s decline started after his overthrow, and those, particularly of the United Party (UP) tradition, who would at best acknowledge him with a curt nod and a shrug – his overthrow on February 24 , his death on April 27 and his birthday on September 21.

Indeed, Nkrumah never dies, as his ardent followers insist.

Airport renaming lawsuit

Last week, the anniversary of Osagyefo’s overthrow captured the nation’s attention once again, but in a rather interesting way.

This time, it was via an announcement by Democracy Hub, a civil society organisation, that it had lodged an application in the Supreme Court for an order to have the name of Lt Gen.

Emmanuel Kwasi Kotoka removed from our nation’s premier airport.

According to the statement, “For 59 years, Ghana has lived with the contradiction of denouncing coups, while honouring one of the architects of the first military overthrow of an elected government.

It is time for Ghana to make a clear statement that it stands against unconstitutional rule, not just in rhetoric but in practice”.

Whilst the statement did not call for the airport to be renamed after President Nkrumah, the fact that the announcement was made on the anniversary of his overthrow was not lost on many, and inevitably there have been calls for just that, along with its controversies.

This lawsuit is interesting in its close resemblance to the famous ‘31st December case’ back in 1993, when the then opposition NPP successfully sued the government in the Supreme Court to ban the celebration of the 31st December Rawlings-led ‘revolution’ with public funds on the grounds that the event being celebrated was an affront to the principles enshrined by the Constitution and therefore was unconstitutional.

However, the naming of the airport after Kotoka is not a recurrent process for which public funds come into play and therefore may be distinguished from the 31st December case. It would be useful to see how this case unfolds.

History detour

Perhaps it would be useful to take a quick detour into memory lane to capture the history behind the airport. Originally constructed in 1943, it was designated as a United States Air Force base and eventually became known as Accra Airport.

In April 1967, Lt Gen. Kotoka, who had with others successfully led the military putsch of 1966 against Nkrumah’s Conventions Peoples Party (CPP) government, was killed at a spot near the airport terminal while trying to quell the counter-coup led by junior military officers against the National Liberation Council (NLC) military junta.

In March 1969, the NLC government, by the General Kotoka Trust [Decree] Act 1969 (NLCD339) renamed the Accra International Airport (AIA) as the Kotoka International Airport (KIA), named an army barracks the Kotoka Barracks and caused to be erected his statue at the spot just outside the airport, where he fell.

I am not sure when the statue was removed, but I saw it on several occasions through the 1980s.

Beyond bread, butter

I disagree rather strongly with those who insist that the lawsuit to remove Kotoka’s name from the airport is a minor issue that distracts from the bread-and-butter issues confronting our nation – not when the Good Book reminds us that man shall not live by bread alone.

Whilst the removal of the name will certainly not feed us, nation-building is not all about life’s basics.

Values, principles and other tenets help to advance the cause, belief systems and aspirations of every society beyond the brick and mortar and milk and honey by serving as its binding agent to make it whole.

We can walk and chew gum at the same time, surely?

In any event, in our nation’s history, we found it necessary to change our name from the Gold Coast to Ghana on independence to send an important message.

Zimbabwe (formerly Southern Rhodesia), Zambia (formerly Northern Rhodesia) Burkina Faso (formerly Upper Volta) and several other African countries have undergone similar post-colonial renaissance experience, and with good justification.

Further afield, the Jan Smuts International Airport in Johannesburg, South Africa, named after a former Prime Minister under apartheid, was renamed Johannesburg International Airport in 1994 after apartheid fell, to reflect the nation’s abhorrence of that wicked system.

Subsequently, in 2006, it was renamed after the celebrated South African nationalist Oliver R Tambo.

Significantly, in Ghanaian culture, we do not name our children after just anyone, and for good reason. I do not know if you, dear reader, know any Christian who named their child after Judas.

Routinely, people change their names to reflect their religious conversion or simply out of a yearning away from English or Bible names to authentically African ones.

Beyond names and name changes, in 2007, we relocated the presidency away from a former slave castle that represented all the indignities our forebears had experienced.

Similarly, in December 2018, the University of Ghana, after loud protests, removed the statue of the late Indian Prime Minister Mahatma Ghandi from its campus on the grounds of his known, blatantly racist views about black people.