In memoriam: Theodosia Asihene Okoh; A national heroine
She designed the Ghana national flag, in all its simple but inspired and inspiring glory. That huge fact aside, as an enthusiastic player, dedicated coach and administrator, she single-handedly rooted the sport of hockey in Ghana. She was also an art teacher and an artist, a keen scrabble player, wife, mother of three, and thinker.
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We Ghanaians do death well. That includes the composition of the funeral "brochure” and its contents. We know how to pour out our love and respect for the dead, as well as finally acknowledge their achievements. However, we also have to admit that since the departed ones are no more here with us, then the obituaries, tributes and dirges are a wonderful, but continuing aspect of the communication with, and for the living; and in her case, part of our current national conversation.
According to Frankie Asare-Donkoh, (Daily Graphic, April 25, 2015) "Mrs Okoh deserved better"; a sentiment that is shared and expressed across this country. Since she has moved on, all we can do is wonder about some of the things Mrs Okoh deserved but didn't get. Due recognition for one: in life, and even now in death. For example, as the designer of the national flag, why should it not have flown half-mast from the day she died until she got buried? Three days only? Amazing.
What Theodosia Asihene actually got was quite handsome, beginning with her marriage to the brilliant Enoch Okoh, a civil servant from the Colonial Secretary’s Office who would eventually become the Secretary to the Cabinet of the new Ghana, and the Head of the Civil Service. For a 35-year-old woman at her country’s Independence, she had a life that most women anywhere in the world could only have dreamed of. She did her fair share of “entertainment: lunch, teas, cocktails and dinners” for the higher echelons of society, local and foreign. She was even part of the inner circle that played host to the Queen of Britain and her entourage when she visited in 1961. Mrs Okoh also had great opportunities to travel the world.
It could even be argued that –for her time and place- Mrs Okoh “had it all.” Except that “it” was not as a result of her singular, many-faceted achievements. For designing the national flag, she was hardly acknowledged even by President Nkrumah and his government. For her pioneering, untiring dedication to the development of hockey in Ghana, Okoe Vanderpuije tried to humiliate her. As for her sensitive, and beautiful artwork, that was simply ignored. Clearly, “it” was exclusively for being a wife.
But then what a wife! In her own words, and on behalf of her “workaholic” husband, Theodosia Okoh said, though “ very nervous, I took matters into my own hands, and requested an appointment with Dr Nkrumah”, who was “charming and easy to talk to.” She told him that her husband needed to rest. “The President burst out laughing when I told him the human body needs a rest and is not like a metal machine which can be easily repaired.”
Mrs Okoh was always clear, and luckily for us and future Ghanaians, she has left her memoir. We thank her children, Ernest Kwasi, Stanley Kwame, Theodosia Amma Manwe and the rest of her family, including the other Asihene legend, Dr Laetitia Obeng. They encouraged this great African to write. Simply and appropriately titled: My Story, the book offers us a taste of her legendary clarity of thinking and expression. In it she introduces herself as "...born on a wet day, on Tuesday, the thirteenth of June, 1922...and my full name is Theodosia Salome Abena Kumea Asihene." This is in contrast to the June 14, which some writers get published as her birthday.
As a couple, Theodosia and Enoch Okoh were reputed to be modest, honest and generous. After their public life came crashing down in the 1966 coup, they were only modestly “okay”. According to Dr K.B. Asante, “…we see how they lived…Theodosia Okoh is not living in some mansion as some latter-day ministers, deputy ministers and senior public officials” are. Although “there was plenty of room for that grabbing which is the bane of high office today.”
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Incidentally, we should not call the very sharp, feisty and bold Mrs Okoh a “heroine”. Heroines are mostly insipid, flighty young women in romance novels. Theodosia Asihene Okoh was not a female version of anything. She was a creative genius and a hero. We rejoice in her life and her achievements, and mourn her passing deeply. Oman Ghana, kose, kose, kose!