The Tales of June 4 and The 1948 Riots

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Created on Tuesday, 02 June 2015 00:00

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The Tales of June 4 and The 1948 Riots

Review- What accounted for the 28 February 1948 civil riots and the June 4 1979 military Uprising?

ABSTRACT

Naval Captain Baffour Assasie-Gyimah(Rtd)- ‘Mythoughts– Reflections On 4th June’ [Revolution]: “June 4th which was an uprising at that time was then considered salvation because it had a semblance of restoring, order and sanity into the Ghana Armed Forces and the political system. In the end lives were lost, some very unfortunately and some perceived to be deserving. Whatever lives that were lost could not be brought back and so very regrettable. These were the heroes of the revolution; But for their blood the country would not have been the same. Others were punished for their culpability. You would be surprised to hear that people were shot dead ostensibly for taking bank loans of not more than Fifty Cedis at the time! Look at Our Beloved Country now or cast your mind back to at least the last fifteen years and determine for yourselves whether Ghanaians have learnt any lessons. For me, the perpetual flame of 4th June which we celebrate today reminds me that fellow citizens paid the supreme prize for less. That is why I am using this occasion of the 35th Anniversary of 4th June to invite all of us on the four obvious matters that have the potential to drag this our beloved country back to a situation far worse than what some people considered to be far worse than unwelcome on 4th June 1979. See how the country is polarised. See the extent of indiscipline in the country see how filth has engulfed us and also see how all our institutions are corrupted to the core, from politicians almost to the last man…”

COMMENTARY & ANALYSIS

As at 1948 the Ghanaian soldier, in comparison to his/her counter-part in the civil service was arguably, poor and less educated. Those few Gold Coasters who had managed to make it to the officers level as Colonel Baidoo once told, had started as raw recruits and had rose to their heights through verifiable hard work, demonstrated regimental obedience and sometimes, through sheer luck as power, began to slip slowly from the hands of their superior White British officers. We observe in passing that many indigenous Gold Coast soldiers, had been perhaps, drafted into the West African Frontier Force not on their own volition but as a matter of necessity for the colonial government who was engaged in series of battles both at home and at abroad. Some of these fighters were Sergeant Adjetey and Corporal Attipoe, whose standoff to British system in Accra, evoked the 28 February 1948 nation-wide riots and self-rule.

At the end of the Second World War, the Gold Coast was entering a period of economic, social and political malaise. The prices of imported goods were exceptionally high and the Colonial Government was according to Francis Adigkwe (1975), attempting to have all disease-infected cocoa trees destroyed. Then was the acute unemployment, arising from the following: firstly, many of the ex-service men had left the army and returned home. Secondly, the elementary schools were producing standard six schools leavers. Both these groups were unskilled, possessing only low clerical skills. Although compared with the pre-war period, Adigkwe notes that the Gold Coast economy was in a state of boom, it was not expanding fast enough to accommodate these unskilled people- the issue was their indeterminate status and role in society. Western education had alienated them from what would have been their traditional status in society. However, the low level of education also barred them from membership of the intelligentsia and educated elite. All these problems compounded were enough to be political dynamite.

“The atmosphere remained ominously calm until 28 February 1948 when the Police at the Christiansberg, opened fire on the ex-service men who were on peaceful parade at the Crossroads near the Governor’s residence. The incident spread like wild fire to towns and cities other than Accra, where 29 persons lost their lives, 235 persons received serious injuries, and property worth £2 million, damaged. The loss of life and property greatly exceeded the immediate causes of the riots which were the local grievances of the ex-service men. For other groups with other grievances, the shooting was exploited as an opportunity to express their dissatisfaction. Among these groups were cocoa farmers who could not understand why the Cocoa Marketing Board was not giving the full world market price for cocoa.” Other grievances were championed by Nii Kwabena Booney- chief of Osu Alata- namely concerns over the very high prices of goods imported from England which added to the profits of the essentially British-controlled commercial class at a time of unemployment. The suspicions of southern-based politicians and the feeling of political insecurity ushered in the political awakening of the Ashanti.

In the Colonial Government’s bid to crush the disturbances the six United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) leaders- namely: JB. Dankwa, Edward Akufo-Addo, Obetsebi Lamptey, Arko-Adjei, William Ofori-Atta and Kwame Nkrumah, known otherwise as the “Big Six”, were arrested. This first briefings from Lieutenant-Colonel David Rees-Williams- the then Labour Member of Parliament for Croydon South Constituency and Under-Secretary of State, said this at House of Commons’ Debate of 01 March 1948: “Rioting occurred in Accra on the afternoon of 28th February. A parade organised by the ex-Service men's Union, which is not recognised by the Gold Coast Legion, got out of hand while it was proceeding to present a petition to senior officers of the Secretariat and Labour Department. The procession was to follow a route agreed with the Commissioner of Police and was then to disperse. But in contravention of the agreed arrangement the procession, reinforced by other elements, attempted to march on Christiansberg Castle, the residence of the Governor. No request had been made by the Union to see the Governor and the procession was in very ugly temper, many taking part being drunk.”

Thus, by inference, the rioters were deemed as drunkards and perhaps, without any serious grievance. Accordingly, the Military forces were ordered in to enforce law and order and by midnight, Accra was under control but only to resurface. Therefore, curfew was imposed in certain parts of Accra and with regulations to control traffic and close roads. In a follow-up inquiry to the state of Accra and the riots, Mr. James Hudson- Ealing North MP (Labour Co-operative) puzzled: “As the Minister has just admitted that a considerable number of the participants in these troubles were drunk, will he now propose to take away the considerable increase of drinking facilities that have recently been made by the Government in these parts of the world?” The Under-Secretary said: “I am not aware that any increase in the facilities has taken place on the Gold Coast in recent years.” How could have such a huge agitators be all drunk?

The troubles of 1948 were in part, swiftly pushed on elements of communists agitators in the country. Yet like the timed-bombed of the June 4 1979 military revolt, the background to the 1948 though could have some embedded political undercurrents, its immediate outburst, was purely economic grievance- on the part of the returning war veterans, not forgetting the general public whose general condition and welfare as history tells us, could be described no more than the following adjectives: poor and needy? The Watson Commission later identified the following as the causes of the 1948 riots as those rooted in socio-political and economic. There was the feeling of political frustrations among the educated Gold Coasters who saw no prospect of ever experiencing political power and who regarded the 1946 Burns Constitution as a mere window-dressing designed to cover their aspirations. Like the current jobless university graduates, perceptions of post 1948 and 1979 republics, the commission yes, also found in 1948 that governance of our country through the chiefs was also a major cause of the political agitation.

Thus, similar to our current trials in respect to the overbearing executive and parliament, the Watson Commission concluded among other things which appear also to be relevant in our current Republic that a substantial measure of constitutional reform was necessary to meet the legitimate aspirations of the indigenous population and made detailed recommendations: establishment of a full representative government. Local authorities were to have elected majorities, while retaining some traditional elements. It proposed an elected Regional Council and a central Legislative Assembly which nearly all members would be elected either directly or indirectly by popular vote. The Committee also proposed the reconstitution of the Executive Council to become responsible for the formulation of policy. But such reforms could not stop the onward march to independence/self-rule which came on 06 March 1957. Dr Nkrumah drove on the back 1948 riots and by 04 September 1961; the Ghana Railway Workers Union had dug CPP’s grave with a massive strike against economic hardships and ideological meddling.

Our history has it that the national strikes were among others, in protest against rises in the cost of living following the introduction of an austerity budget in July, and notably against a compulsory savings scheme. We mention in passing that as usual leading opposition members such as Dr. J. B. Danquah and Mr. Joe Appiah were some of the suspects and subjected to arrest, including Mr. Patrick Quaidoo- a CPP Cabinet member until May 1961. President Nkrumah cut short his holiday in the U.S.S.R. to return to Ghana on 16.September and on 28 September also asked six members of his Government, including two Cabinet Ministers (Mr K. A. Gbedemah and Mr Kojo Botsio), to resign in view of what he termed as their “varied business connexions”; that six other Ministers and members of the Government had accepted his request that they should surrender parts of their assets to the State; and that he had drawn the attention of the Speaker of the National Assembly to “the extensive nature of his business interests.” [xx]

By 24 February 1966, the military which were once deployed in 1948 to forestall law and order had putsch the CPP government out of office and some of the main accusation leveled against it were corruption and economic mismanagement. Post-1948 riots accounted for two republics of 1960 and 1969 - championed by Dr Nkrumah and Professor Kofi Abrefa-Busia of CPP and Progress Party (PP), respectively. Both the National Liberation Council (NLC) of 24 February 1966 and the National Redemption Council (NRC) of 13 January 1972 military coups accused their immediate civilian governments of bribery and corruption. In justifying the overthrow of Progress Party (PP), the NRC’s leader: Colonel I. K. Acheampong, is quoted to have raised the following issues about the country [xx]:

First: deteriorating state of the economy, and particularly, the negative repercussions of the devaluation of the cedi; the alleged corruption of the Busia-led regime and third, their (ousted government’s) inability to show any understanding for the conditions of the common man. At his first press conference, Col Acheampong did not only deplore the previous government’s lack of "... will to act decisively on this (economic) crisis..." but further attacked "... the system that exploited the ordinary people, the workers and the farmers on whose sweat and toil the wheel of the economy turns..." The June 4 uprising triumphed against the backdrop of an abortive mutiny of May 15, 1979 which led to the arrest, detention and the rescue of Flt-Lt J.J. Rawlings. We paraphrase what Rawlings said on 30 June 1979 following the overthrow of the byproduct of the Acheampong-orchestrated Supreme Military Council (SMCI & II):

“…the AFRC is not to stop the return to civilian rule but to clear up the mess created by the previous regimes. The action represented a revolt of the ordinary Ghanaian against social injustice, against economic hardship and against the cancer of corruption that had eaten deep into the fabric of our society,” Chairman J.J Rawlings emphasized this on Radio and TV broadcast. Some of General F.W.K Akuffo’s political woes were said to be employment of orthodox devices in the implementation of his economic policies. Thus, to curtail inflation, he for example, “reduced the monetary supply by holding back increases in government expenditures to 11 per cent in 1978-1979 (in contrast to 59 per cent the previous fiscal year), which in turn necessitated a clampdown on government borrowing from the Central Bank.” Those who were grown enough under Akufos regime still recall to memory how in August, 1978, the SMCII regime devalued the cedi by 58.2% against the US$, (i.e from 1.15 to 2.75).

Then was one of the said evils of the SMCI & II- manipulations of import license that in the opinion of AFRC, allegedly, favoured its few military and civilian cronies. No wonder, numerous business entrepreneurs- most notably, the B.B. Brothers and the J. K. Siaws of fame, not forgetting expatriate firms, were targeted and by the AFRC revolutionary benchmarks, their assets seized or confiscated. The AFRC, according to the NRC Final Report, ruled for 112 days before handing over power on 24 September 1979, to the Dr Hilla Limann-led elected Peoples National Party (PNP) government. Some of the AFRC’s political trump cards which the PNP struggled to measure up were the said 'House cleaning' debut against bribery and corruption and confiscation of what was then termed as ill-gotten private assets. The military putsch also claimed the lives of the country’s three former military heads of state- namely: Lieutenant-General Akwasi Amankwaa Afrifa; General Kutu Acheampong and Lieutenant-General Frederick William Akuffo, by open execution at the Teshie Military Range on 26 June 1979.

In addition to this were five Supreme Military Council’s top-hierarchy- Rear-Admiral Joy Kobla Amedume (Navy Commander); Air-Vice-Marshal George Yaw Boakye (Air Force); Major-General Robert Ebenezer Abossey Kotei(Chief of Defence Staff); Major-General E.K. Utuka(Border Guards) and Colonel Roger Joseph Felli(Foreign Affairs), were summarily found corrupt by the AFRC’s Special Court and accordingly, also executed by firing squad. Today, Naval Captain Baffour Assasie-Gyimah (Rtd)- an AFRC/[P]NDC enthusiast, who seems worried about corrupted judgment debts, states there is too much corruption in Ghana. “Ghanaians have become too bold and fearless of the repercussions corruption. Gone are the days when politicians were scared of displaying even whatever wealth they had legitimately acquired. Now they do not care to show how many mansions they have built within the short period of entering politics when they can never explain how their earnings could account for the sudden wealth. Why can’t we Ghanaians enter politics to serve? Why can’t we be like the President of Uruguay who still lives in his own little house and still drives his 1986 VW Beetle vintage,” he puzzles.

This commentary is authored by Asante Fordjour and in contemplation of the 1948 riots and all the [un]resolved grievances that flew through it in Ghana- including a focal analysis on the June 4 revolt that atoned human blood. Today is 02 June and at the time of going to press the cedi-dollar rates, are Gh4.12:$1. The catchwords remain bribery, corruption, ostentatious lifestyle of politicians and threats of workers’ revolts. It’s unclear whether Ghana could unite itself on these in our life time or generation. What the Ghana needs, respectfully, might be the focus to bring together the broken pieces of its internal blocks which continue to settle after some half-a-century internal/external demolitions and wreckage! The Ghanaian leader must begin to see the prudence in creating wealth for all its peoples- especially, through education and training of its impoverished and dejected youth rather than putting themselves, families and friends ahead- at the apex of Africa's human development indexes and economic successes.

Thus, whatever we are doing or whichever position we find yourself in Ghana, we ought to pause for a moment and to reflect, whether our [in]actions measure up to the ideals and principles of June 4 1979. If the answers are no, then one could predict without hesitations that the jobless and hopeless youth of our generation unlike those intelligentsias and the socio-economically distressed and frustrated army veteran or active service personnel of ancient; who also fought for political inclusion and independence, [as the current Mediterranean Sea catastrophe for which the African leadership or the African Union (AU) appeared helpless to its citizens], might soon crave for recolonization of his country- rather than the cause of the African Unity rhetoric. It might be just a matter of time and the African leader indeed need to Act Now! As Baffour Assasie-Gyimah cautions our country, it could be too late- Ghana is headed closer to the precipice and to our own destruction if we do not yes, stop the greed now; and don’t even look back.

JusticeGhana

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A letter from Dr. Okechukwu Ikejianni, Sc. D., M.D., F.R.C. Pathology to Ako-Adjei

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Created on Tuesday, 10 February 2015 00:00

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A letter from Dr. Okechukwu Ikejianni to Ako-Adjei

Written by Dr. Okechukwu Ikejianni

10th February 2015

My Dear Ako,

I do not know exactly where to begin this letter. It has been a long , long time. I think I will begin from the last time we saw each other in Accra.

It was, I believe in 1962 and I was returning by boat to Nigeria. I was to meet Mr. Nkrumah but he-had suffered from a "bomb" and asked you and the Minister of Education. Mr. Kojo Botio to meet me. After visiting the housing estate in Tema, we drove to your house for lunch. Shandor and Kobina Mbura were there. After some drinks, we all went downstairs to the dining room- and a prayer was said after being served with food.

It was at that time that you were called and the police took you away. As soon as I learnt what happened from Dr. Shandorf, I was mad and made a statement to the press that this was shocking. My guests and I sorrowfully returned to the boat that day. When we arrived in Nigeria, Zik wrote a letter to Nkrumah and asked me to go and deliver it to him in person in Ghana. I did . It was at that time that Nkrumah told me that you were the person who planted the bomb that hurt him.

I did not believe it but he swore it to be true. I met Nkrumah again in exile in 1970 at Conakrey, Guinea. At that meeting, He confessed to me that he had found out that it was his Chief of Police who planted the bomb and laid the blame on you he swore he did not learn about this until he was in exile in Guinea.

At that time he was suffering from cancer of the prostate which finally killed him when he was flown to Rumania or somewhere to be treated, As I said, it has been a long time.

I enclose herewith a photograph we all took in Lincoln in 1939. I trust you can identify all of us. I am afraid that only you, Orizu and I are still alive, in that photograph. Professor Nwankwo Chukwuemeka died last year soon after the Right Honorable Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe died- Zik was coming to me in Canada every year for the last ten years for medical check-up until his last visit in the summer of 1995. How is Dr. Shandorf? We corresponded with each but about three years now, I have not heard from him. I am anxious to know about Kobina Mbura. Please will you kindly give me his address.

This letter is being sent through Mr. John Ighorewo. John is a personal friend and he is my "son". John is from Nigeria and lives here in Ottawa. He has been exploring some business opportunities in Ghana with some Canadian partners for about eighteen months now. They ran into some crooks who have duped them. He narrated the heart- rendering story to me and I promised that I shall write you as you can give him all the advise he needs in doing business in Ghana.

I will appreciate whatever help you can give him so that they will succeed in their business. Incidentally, I retired last June after twenty-six years practice as a pathologist in Nova Scotia. I left and migrated to Canada after the civil war. Nigeria has lost its soul. The country now is not what Zik and my compatriots worked to free from Britain. Incidentally, there is a book published by Freedom Publication, Lego n Ghana written by Miss Marika Sherwood. It is called Kwame Nkrumah The Years Abroad. It is an interesting book, I am sure you have a copy. I trust you are well and so your wife and children. Pat joins me in sending our best wishes to you and yours...

Dr. Okechukwu Ikejianni - Orleans, Ontario Canada near Ottawa Dr. Ako Adjei's personal friend(Class Of 1939 Lincoln U.)

[link missing]Below is a Satellite sound recorded interview with Dr. Okechukwu Ikejianni on June 6th 2002. He is the only survivor of the first 8 African students at Lincoln in the U.S. He graduated in 1942 - You can download or just listen to the interview; these clips are uncut, unedited and original; more at Leaders Kwame Nrumah's Confession About the "Bomb" that lead to Dr. Ako Adjei's arrest for no apparent reason. This is very baseless thinking on behalf of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah.

He had earlier informed the President of his wish to stop over in Ghana and pay his respects with his wife, children and a few friends who were en-route by sea to Nigeria. Just as the party had settled for lunch at his home, it was at that instance that Dr. Kwame Nkrumah and the Police came to arrest him for a cause or causes he was not advised of until he was put in the condemned cells at the Nsawam Medium Security Prison. He was served with indictment or charges of:

1) Conspiracy to commit Treason and

2) Treason, together with four other persons, namely, Robert Benjamin Otchere, Joseph Yaw Manu, Tawia Adamafio and Hugh Horatio Cofie Crabbe.

They were tried by a Special Court constituted by Justice K. Arku Korsah, Chief Justice, Mr. Justice W. B. van Lare and Mr. Justice E. Akufo Addo, both Justices of the Supreme Court. On Monday 9th December, 1963, the Special Court, which had sat from Friday 9th August 1963 through to Monday, 28th October, 1963, acquitted and discharged Tawia Adamafio, Ako Adjel and Cofie Crabbe on all charges. Notwithstanding their acquittal and discharge, these three gentlemen were not released from prison, but rather, were taken back to the Nsawam Medium Security Prison on the orders of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the President.

The harrowing experience in the condemned cell continued as before. On 10th December, 1963, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the President of Ghana, declared the whole trial at the Special Court null and void. He also made an order, dismissing from office the Chief Justice of Ghana, Sir Arku Korsah and the other two judges who together with the Chief Justice presided over the Special Court. The President Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, ordered a retrial of the three accused persons by another" Special Court" specially constituted by him. The newly constituted "Special Court" had the newly appointed Chief Justice of Ghana, namely, Mr. Justice J. Sarkodee-Adoo as the sole member, sitting with a jury of twelve young-men, recruited from the Kwame Nkrumah ideological College.

The Ghana Bar Association, realizing that the action taken by the President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, in declaring the earlier trial null and void, dismissing the trial judges and reconstituting another special court amounted to undue interference in the administration of justice in Ghana, resolved that none of its members should appear for any of the accused persons. The GBA considered the whole process as a complete travesty of justice and a flagrant violation of the fundamental principle of the Rule of Law in a civilized Society.

The second trial was conducted partly in public in the Supreme Court Buildings in Accra and partly in camera at the Castle Osu, Accra. The public and the Press were excluded from the trial in camera. During his summing up the Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Sakordee-Adoo wept bitterly and openly. Dr Ako Adjei recorded in his autobiography, The African Dream, that he was amazed to see the Chief Justice weeping bitterly "with tears streaming down his cheeks."

He felt sorry for him and pitied him for the part he was taking in his second trial, because he, Dr. Ako Adjei, knew he was innocent. Dr. Ako Adjei was found guilty and sentenced to death, as was each of the four other accused persons. In response to the Chief Justice's offer to the accused to say a few words before sentence, Dr. Ako Adjei said that he was innocent, but if the Jury had said that he was guilty, he would leave the matter in the hands of God, his Father. He was taken, together with the other accused persons, back to the condemned cells.

The sentence was later commuted to twenty years in prison. Whilst he was in the condemned cell, he heard Mr. Samuel Danso Amaning (at one time Deputy Commissioner of Police), who was also being kept in a condemned cell, shouting at the top of his voice and mentioning the names of Ako Adjei, Tawiah Adamafio and Cofie Crabbe, that each of them should forgive him for the leading role he took in fabricating the treason charges against them, which resulted in their trials at the two special courts. The excruciating experiences that Dr. Ako Adjei went through during his period in the condemned cells, so overwhelmed him, that he found it difficult to recount or talk about them. He wrote: "It was a period of harrowing experience and bitter affliction".

He had no doubt that it was only "by the Grace of God my loving Father that I survived”, he concluded. Indeed, since his release from Nsawam Medium Security Prison on 6th September 1966, by the National Liberation Council (NLC), after the overthrow of the First Republic, he never stopped praising and thanking God Almighty for protecting and delivering him from his affliction. From then on, he devoted his time to the Almighty God, his family, his law practice and farming. In 1978, Dr. Ako Adjei was appointed by the Supreme Military Council II Government as one of the Members of the Constitutional Commission who drafted the Third Republican Constitution of Ghana. On 7th March 1997, the highest National Honor of the Republic of Ghana, Officer of the Order of the Star of Ghana, was conferred on him by the President on behalf of the Government and People of Ghana.

This was followed by a durbar of Chiefs, as well as a dinner at The International Conference Centre on 15th March 1997, by The Ga-Dangme Association. The Ghana Bar Association honoured him for his Statesmanship in January 1999. On 11 December 1999, he received a Certificate of Honour from Labone Secondary School. He received a Millenium Excellence Award for Outstanding Statesman in December 1999.

The Methodist Church Ghana honoured him in June 2000 by naming the Conference Hall of the Rev. Peter Kwei Dagadu of the Memorial Methodist Church at Osu, after him. Dr. E. Ako Adjei wrote two books, namely: The African Dream and Life and Work of George Alfred Grant respectively. He was honoured by his Alma Mater, Accra Academy, during its 70th anniversary celebrations in July 2001. Dr. Ako Adjei left behind a loving wife, children, grandchildren, family, friends and a host of admirers.

Source: http://www.niica.on.ca/Ghana/LetterToAkoAdjei.aspx, date accessed, 09 February 2015

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The Foment of Ghana’s Liberations

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Created on Thursday, 12 March 2015 00:00

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The Foment of Ghana’s Liberations

A Review of Kwame Nkrumah’s problems with the UP traditionalists, “old comrades”, Preventive Detention Act (PDA) and the Political Death of JB Danquah and the CPP

BRIEFS & MEMOS

Prof Justice A. K. P. Kludze [1]- (Human Rights, Individual Freedoms and Democracy in Ghana- the Preventive Detention Act and After): “After the ignominious fall of Kwame Nkrumah from power, the notorious Preventive Detention Act, one of the legacies of that repressive era, was repealed. The thousands of prisoners still being held in prisons under that pernicious law were promptly released. There was jubilation throughout the country as those falsely imprisoned were able to return home to join their families. The atmosphere in the whole country was buoyant. It did not matter that some of the returning detainees were sick and infirm as a result of the long years of unlawful incarceration under horrendous conditions. There was hope that Ghana would chart a new course of freedom and justice after the end of Nkrumah’s dictatorship…Those who today, do not revel in the repeal of the Preventive Detention Act, continue to say that it was the American Central Intelligence (C.I.A.) which rescued Ghanaians from dictatorship. If the C.I.A. was powerful enough to do this in far away Africa, one wonders why it could not overthrow the communist regime only 90 miles off the American shores in Cuba…” The counter argument had been that unlike Fidel Castro of Cuba, in the Republic of Ghana, ‘Nkrumah strove to follow the advice of his mentor- George Padmore, who lies buried in Christianborg Castle to pursue a social[construction]revolution without waiting to consolidate the national revolution?’

COMMENTARY

The leaders of the 1966 military coup, including army officer colonel E.K. Kotoka, Major A.A. Afrifa, Lieutenant-General J.A. Ankrah (Rtd), and Police Inspector-General J.W.K Harley, justified their takeover by alleging that the CPP was abusive and corrupt. They were equally astonished by Nkrumah’s aggressive meddling in Africa politics and by his fatwa that Ghanaian troops could be sent anywhere in Africa to fight so-called liberation wars, even though they never did so. That aside, they lamented over the absence of democratic practices in our country- reasoning that this had affected the morale of the armed forces. According to General Kotoka, the military putsch of 1966 was a nationalist call because it liberated the nation from Nkrumah’s dictatorship- this declaration was supported by Nkrumah’s own former minister of foreign affairs: Alext Quaison Sackey. But today too, overconcentration of power on the presidency, hero-worshipping, ideological proliferation at all-level of society- including economic mismanagement, remains a hallmark of Ghanaian politics, heralding a call for new liberations or change.

In his book- Gold Coast in Transition, anthropologist David E. Apter [2]- who spent a considerable time in the Gold Coast examining the effect of political modernization–both through British rule and the development of self-government–on the traditional ways of life, tribal government, the structures of economic and political power, among others, ploughed extensive fields in relation to the background to this political epoch. The result, as Henry L. Roberts, put it in his book review of 1956, highlights not only the roles and influences of the traditional authorities and the emerging nationalist or the intelligentsias in the post-independence democratic Ghana but also, a comprehensive analysis of a process and the outcome of which was at the time not clearly discernible. Not forgetting the teeming youthful CPP disciples who saw their political bid being ditched by the life-leadership of the Osagyefo?

By virtue of Article 8(1) of the 1960 Constitution, President Kwame Nkrumah was named as the first president of the republic. He had no vice-president- neither from within his own Convention People’s Party (CPP) nor outside of it. History had it that his political or ideological counter-weight was one JB Danquah of the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) or the amalgamation of opposing political force to be named United Party (UP) and perhaps, once, one of the Nkrumah’s political employers. No wonder JB Danquah became what historians could describe as the shadow of political and ideological threat or should we say, the prime suspect of all the political upheavals and periodic assassination attempts directed at Nkrumah’s person. Most notable- being the Kululungu bomb attack which led to the arrest and detention of some of the CPP inner-cells such as Ebenezer Ako-Adjei and Tawia Adamafio.

The President was returning from the then Upper Volta, now known as Burkina Faso, after peace talks and to negotiate among others, for the construction of the Volta Dam, with the then Upper Volta President- Maurice Yameogo. He decided to make a stop-over at Kulungugu, to acknowledge the chiefs, school children and people of this village, who had line-up in waiting for hours under scorching sun to meet him. During this reception, a bomb that had been shrouded in a bouquet of flower was given to a young school pupil, to be presented to the Osagyefo on behalf of the people, exploded, injurig the schoolgirl. This ignited emergency security measures that were to be unpopular with many Ghanaians.

In his article “The Price of Progress”, George W. Shepherd, Jr. [3], offers some insight about the 11 August1962 attack, stating it is not a simple matter to untangle the complex web of conflicts in Ghana and to point to the precise sources of the violence as not all the evidence has been presented. Yet, he describes Nkrumah’s goals and indicates the major sources of opposition to them: “A few days after the Osagyefo (President Nkrumah) had been hailed as a “liberator” by the 11th Congress of the Convention People’s Party (CP) with women strewing garments in the street and singing “Lead Kindly Light,” a bomb explosion at Kulungungu nearly took his life. Following a such second bomb attack in Accra, martial law was declared and the army began a house-to-house search for the terrorist. Several people were arrested, including a member of high officials: Coffie Crabbe- executive Secretary of the CPP; Ako Adjei- Foreign Minister; and Tawia Adamafio- Minister of Information. These disturbing events have led to considerable speculation that the power structure of Nkrumah was crumbling. Is this the case?”

Indeed since history is said be written from ideological or class perspective, the Trinidadian C.L.R James’ [4] book on Nkrumah’s Revolution, might be a recommended read, at least for those who seek better historical insight from a man who had been so close to Dr Nkrumah right from his heydays as independence nationalist agitator and later, as a Pan-African crusader and messiah. So for example, from journalistic and legal interests, we dare register however, that since governments and even regimes around the world take credits for all good omen that are bestowed on their countries/nations even where they had neither played little nor a role in such heights/achievements, it could be inferred from the perspective of the said unverified JB Danquah’s Nsawam Prisons Cell’s Letters that Nkrumah could vicariously, hardly escape personal and indeed the presidential responsibility for JB Danquah’s death.

James has this comment about the Osagyefo and his Ghana’s Revolution: “In 1963 I had occasion to write to him of my concern at a second attempt to assassinate him: I implied that something was seriously wrong with a regime in which there were two attempts at assassinating the political head of state: I knew that in 1957 over large part of Ghana Nkrumah could have walked for days without single attendant. His reply to this letter I found most lacking in his customary political sense…. I was deeply disturbed about the way things were going….The continuous crisis in Ghana had reached a climax when Nkrumah dismissed his Chief Justice for giving a judicial decision which he disapproved… this act showed the degeneration not only of the [CPP] regime but of his own conception of government…”[ibid]

With its sustained electoral fortunes and roll-overs, spanning from the beginning of the 1950s to the first-quarter in the 1960s, the CPP and Nkrumah had the mandate and the power to revoke a Supreme Court decision, dismissed its panel of judges [Justices W.B. Van Lare, Edward Akuffo Addo and Chief Justice K. Arku-Korsah] and called for a retrial and conviction of some of the said suspected Kulungugu mastermind bombers- when the court set the three- Tawia Adamafio, Ako Adjei and Coffie Crabbe, free and convicted an opposition Member of Parliament- R.B Otchere, and Yaw Manu, an opposition activist, who had pleaded guilty for their various roles in the Kulungugu bomb attack. Thus, when on 9 December 1963 the justices handed its verdict which appeared unfavourable to the President, he swiftly invoked his special power granted under the 1960 Constitution and by 10th December 1963, Nkrumah had revoked the ruling “null and void”, and on 25 December 1963, dispatching Chief Justice Arku Korsah and the other two judges who together with the Chief Justice presided over the Special Court.[5]

The newly constituted “Special Court” was branded with a new Chief Justice of Ghana- one Mr. Justice J. Sarkodee-Adoo as the sole member, sitting with, as Dr Ako-Adjei remembers- a jury of twelve young-men, recruited from the Kwame Nkrumah ideological College. The second trial was conducted partly in public in the Supreme Court Buildings in Accra and partly in camera at the Castle Osu, Accra. The public and the Press were excluded from the trial in camera. “During his summing up the Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Sakordee-Adoo wept bitterly and openly,” Dr Ako Adjei recorded in his autobiography. “The African Dream that he was amazed to see the Chief Justice weeping bitterly “with tears streaming down his cheeks.” It must be noted that on Monday 9th December, 1963, the Court, that sat from Friday 9th August 1963 through to Monday, 28th October 1963, acquitted the old comrades on all charges. [5]

Notwithstanding, they were not released from prison, but rather, together with two other convicts- and here, Robert Benjamin Otchere and Joseph Yaw Manu, taken back to the condemned cells at Nsawam Medium Security Prison on the orders of President Kwame Nkrumah. The convicts had earlier on been served with indictment or charges of the following:1) Conspiracy to commit Treason and 2) Treason. [5] Article 4(1) of the 1960 Constitution proclaims Ghana as a socialist unitary state- from monarchy to a republic and Article 8(2) confers Executive powers on the President and the position of Governor-General abolished and replaced with the President who combined the post of Governor-General and the Prime Minister post. The special powers under Art 8(3) of the Constitution, bestowed the commander-in-chief of the Ghana Armed Forces and a “Fount of Hournour” on the President. Art 8(4) states in exercise of his functions she or he was to act in his discretion and not bound to take anybody’s advice.

So for example, it appeared at the time that there existed little room to bring to a halt some of the said misguided and misinterpretations of some of the constitutional powers and the excesses of the PDA. Indeed there could be sure, other arguments to the contrary raised above. But in our contemporary Ghana, just ponder over these in passing: what if for example, ailing Tsatsu Tsikata of Presidential Petition fame or Honourbale Adamu Dramani- former Member of Parliament for Bawku Central had without presidential interventions of J.A. Kufuor and JD Mahama, perished in their various prison cells? Without motivation in the discussion of the relevant provisions in the PDA and the Re Akoto and The Supreme Court Revisited[6], we mention in passing the legal interpretation of Article 13(1) of the 1960 Constitution and here, in relation to its consistency with the PDA (1958 (No. 17 of 1958) under which the Seniour Linguist of the Asantehene- Baffour Osei Akoto, and Seven Others; and later, JB Danquah himself, who had on the 28th day of August 1961, been the lead counsel for said detained defendants.

The grounds for the detention of Baffour Osei Akoto, and Seven Others- namely: Peter Alex Danso (alias Kwaku Danso), Osei Assibey Mensah, Nana Antwi Bosiako (alias John Mensah), Joseph Kojo Antwi-Kusi (alias Anane Antwi-Kusi), Benjamin Kweku Owusu, Andrew Kojo Edusei, and Halidu Kramo, were summarily detained without trial on an offence “prejudicial to the security of the State”. That they encouraged the commission of acts of violence in the Ashanti and Brong-Ahafo and associated themselves with persons who have adopted a policy of violence as a means of achieving political aims in those regions. From the tone of JB’s letter, no formal charge was brought against him.

Professor Justice Klutze quotes His Grace Peter Akwasi Sarpong- Archbishop Emeritus of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Kumasi, to have said this in one of his public lectures- “Truth, Integrity and Democratic Development: How Ghana is Faring.” “Kwame Nkrumah and his Convention People’s Party (CPP) came and demanded ‘self-government now.’ When he got it, he introduced very many worthy projects and in fact, he was ideologically so resourceful that most of the projects Ghana is now pursuing were all on his drawing board…..“But in the course of his great work for Ghana, he just disregarded the main reason why he was Head of State in the first place. He was Head of State to bring a measure of peace, love, abundance and security to Ghana. While he sought abundance, he forgot about human rights, the dignity of the human person; he forgot about the security of the Ghanaian; he became a tyrant…. The security that he was supposed to give to his people became a charade. He had no idea of integrity. People were oppressed; people were imprisoned because they did not follow him blindly…” [1]

But Nkrumah said in his October speech, following the Kululungu bomb attack ‘that his difficulties with old comrades arose because of “a certain individuals who, having satisfied themselves with the personal gains they derived from the first revolution [thus, independence or redemption from colonialism], found it difficult and were unwilling to move forward with the second revolution of economic and social construction.” Thus in his view, his problems with the tribal groups and the United Party (UP) are primarily attributable to their resentment over the transfer of power to the CPP, while his more recent troubles stem from the non-revolutionary interests in the both the country and the CPP. These dissidents have aligned themselves with foreign interests that find themselves damaged by the socialist and African liberation drives of Ghana. While this argument sounds plausible, does it account for the violence? [3]

It is found that the President’s troubles with the Ashanti were certainly related to the allocation of power following the national revolution. Some of those with the UP arose from the more conservative outlook of its intelligentsia leaders like Dr K.A. Busia who is said to have had little empathy with the masses and their revolution. “Pressing the pace of change of change in this relentless way inevitably arouses great opposition. While virtually all interests favoured independence, important groups have resisted increased taxation, tight trade controls, nationalization programs, local government reorganization, government control over education and the press, the liquidation of certain farm and trade union groups, and the consolidation of youth movements under the Young Pioneers…” In early 1964, in order to prevent future challenges from the judiciary, Nkrumah obtained a constitutional amendment allowing him to dismiss any judge. Eventually, Ghana became a one-party state with an act of parliament that ensured that there would be only one candidate for president-, who shall officially, come from the CPP. Thus the dreams and aspirations of other political parties were shredded into dustbin and no non-CPP candidates came forward to challenge the vacant slots in the general elections announced for June 1965.

CONCLUSION

Dr Kwame Nkrumah had been re-elected president of the country for less than a year when the military-cum-police (NLC) booted the CPP out of government on February 24, 1966 while Nkrumah was in China. He later sought asylum in Guinea, where he dwelt until he died in 1972. It might be worthy to note that all successive leaders that came after Nkrumah, had been directly or indirectly, accused of the very political crimes that CPP and its stalwarts of the 1960s were said to have committed. For most ordinary Gold Coasters in the 1940s, the 1946 Burns Constitution made wide ranging reforms. Yet at Saltpond the UGCC- JB Danquah and Paa George Grant among others, attacked the constitution and accordingly, labeled it as “outmoded at birth” because colonial government failed to tackle black pod diseases, the economic hardships during post-1945 war and the discontent of war veterans, not forgetting the 1948 shooting incident that erupted public hues and cries, and the advent of the first-ever liberation?

References

[1] Prof Justice A. K. P. Kludze, “Human Rights, Individual Freedoms and Democracy in Ghana- the Preventive Detention Act and After”, http://baffuorakoto.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=51:lecture-by-prof-justice-a-k-p-kludze&catid=36:lectures&Itemid=54, date accessed, 09 February 2015

[2] David E. Apter, "The Gold Coast in Transition" (Edward R. O'Connor-The Review of Politics, Cambridge University, Cambridge University Press, (Vol. 19, No. 3 (Jul., 1957), pp. 388-390), http://www.jstor.org/stable/1404784, date accessed, 09 February 2015

[3] George W. Shepherd, Jr., “The Price of Progress”, (Africa Today Vol. 9, No. 10 (Dec., 1962), pp. 4-6+14, Published by: Indiana University Press, Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4184367, date accessed, 09 February 2015

[4] James, C.L.R. (1978), Nkrumah and the Ghana Revolution , Lawrence Hill & Co., ISBN-10: 0882080776; ISBN-13: 978-0882080772

[5] Okechukwu Ikejianni, “A letter from Dr. Okechukwu Ikejianni to Ako-Adjei”, http://www.niica.on.ca/Ghana/LetterToAkoAdjei.aspx, date accessed, 09 February 2015

[6] The Samaritan Research Group, "The Re: Akoto and The Supreme Court Revisited", http://www.justiceghana.com/index.php/en/2012-01-24-13-49-19/6305-the-re-akoto-and-the-supreme-court-revisited

JusticeGhana

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JusticeGhana Editors Note: At COMMENTARY- and at paragraph four(4)we earlier reported that a bomb that had been shrouded in a bouquet of flower was given to a young school pupil, to be presented to the Osagyefo on behalf of the people, exploded, killing the schoolgirl. The "killing should have read: "injuring". The schoolgirl has been identified as Elizabeth Asantewaa who is still alive. Sorry for any inconvenience caused. Thank you.

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Doyen of Ghana Politics - J. B. Danquah, A Tribute

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Doyen of Ghana Politics - J. B. Danquah, A Tribute

Written and Compiled by Kwesi Atta Sakyi

30th January 2015

Joseph Boakye Danquah has been described as the doyen of Ghanaian politics. This accolade was given to him by the Watson Commission of 1948 which was set up following the riots in the Gold Coast. Danquah and Busia belonged to the Dombo or Matemeho conservative and federalist grouping, as well as the Danquah-Busia school of thought in Ghana’s political history. J.B. Danquah was an Akyem with his step-brother from the royal family of Kyebi (Kibi). In 1921, he was sponsored by the Abuakwa State, ruled by his step-brother, Nana Sir Ofori Atta III to go and read law in the UK. Before then, he had completed and passed his standard seven examinations, popularly called Hall in those days.

He was apprenticed to a renowned lawyer in Accra, where he worked for some time before being assigned to the Supreme Court, and later to the Eastern Regional House of Chiefs. In the UK, he earned his first degree from the University of London, and upon passing with flying colours, he went on to earn his Phd in Moral Philosophy and Logic, the first West African to do so.

Danquah was a maternal uncle of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo. When Nkrumah was invited by Ako Adjei to come from the UK to become the Secretary General of the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC), the UGCC was led by stalwarts like J.B. Danquah, Paa Willie or William Ofori Atta, Pa Grant, a Takoradi-based timber merchant and business tycoon, and others like Casely Hayford. Those were among the intelligentsia in the then Gold Coast. UGCC was founded in 1947 at Saltpond by J.B. Danquah, George Alfred Grant, Robert Benjamin Blay, and Awoonor Williams, a Sekondi Barrister.

Danquah’s private life was full of romance. While in London from 1921 to 1927, he fathered two sons and two daughters from two women, none of whom he married. When he got back to the Gold Coast, he got married to the daughter of a prominent lawyer. The lass’s name was Mable Dove. Later, he married his second wife, Elizabeth Vardon. Who in Danquah’s position in those days would not have fallen for the ladies, or rather the ladies would not have fallen for him? Danquah was a conservative traditionalist, and polygamist. On his return to the Gold Coast in 1927, he was offered the post of master at Achimota College to succeed no less a person than James Emmanuel Kwegyir Aggrey. (It was to Achimota that Kwame Nkrumah also went for his teacher training education in the early 1930s.)

Danquah declined the offer at Achimota and set up his own private law practice. In those days, private chambers run by blacks were uncommon, and I guess Danquah was an enterprising entrepreneur, who saw opportunities galore or a market gap to exploit. Danquah was born on 21st December, 1895 at Bempong-Kwahu to Emmanuel Yaw Boakye, and Madam Lydia Okum Korantewaa. Danquah’s father was chief drummer at the palace of Nana Amoako Atta III, Omanhene of Akyem Abuakwa.

It was Danquah’s elder sibling from another mother, who was 14 years older, who later became Nana Sir Ofori Atta III. It was he and the Abuakwa State who sponsored Danquah to go and study law in the UK. On his return from London, he set up an influential newspaper known as the Times of West Africa. He served as the Secretary of a delegation to London in 1934 which was to petition the Colonial Office against the introduction of the obnoxious Sedition Bill and the Water Bill.

Those bills were meant to restrict the rights and freedoms of our people. Danquah served as Secretary General of the Gold Coast Youth Conference (GCYC) from 1937 to 1947. GCYC was founded in 1929 by Casely Hayford. GCYC was the forerunner of the UGCC. He was elected to the Legislative Council in 1946, under the Burn’s Constitution. He fought relentlessly to bring about constitutional reforms. He championed the cause of farmers so much so that he was awarded a citation by the farmers, who called him Akuafo Kanea (The Light of the farmers). Danquah helped to found the United Gold Coast Convention, which demanded self- government for the Gold Coast. The UGCC was founded on 4th August, 1947 at Saltpond.

On 13th March 1948, he was arrested with the Big Six following the 1948 riots which had earlier on culminated in the shooting incident at the Crossroads, on 28th February 1948, of Sergeant Adjetey, near the Christianborg Castle. The ex-servicemen were on their way to the Castle to present their petition of being neglected after their return from the 2nd World War, when one colonial police officer called Captain Imray, ordered their shooting. Before then, one Ga Chief, Nii Kwabena Bonne III, Osu Alata Mantse, had organized a boycott of all European shops and there was looting and pillaging of shops across the length and breadth of the Gold Coast Colony.

Some shops belonging to expatriates were torched down. The Colony became ungovernable, and the Governor had to call in troops from Nigeria to quell the riot. Danquah used his influence and tenacity to convince the Asante (Ashanti) to become part of the coastal colony called the Gold Coast. He fiercely fought to have the indigenization of the civil service, and dominance of the legislative assembly by African representatives.

Indeed, Danquah was a true and real patriot. His 1943 constitutional memorandum formed the basis of the 1945 Burn’s Constitution.In 1951, he was again elected to the Legislative Council, which was a very much privileged position in those colonial days. He failed to be elected in the 1954 and 1956 elections. When he lost, he claimed the elections were rigged. In 1960, Danquah contested the presidential elections against Nkrumah in the Presidential elections but he received only 10% of the votes cast.

In 1961, he was imprisoned under the Preventive Detention Act (PDA) and was released in 1962. He became the President of the Ghana Bar Association. He was rearrested in 1964 and sent to the condemned cells at the infamous Nsawam Maximum Security Prison, where he died of a heart attack on 4th February, 1965, aged 69 years. He was said to be diabetic. He left behind ten children from his wedded wife, though there were other children on the sides from his earlier amorous adventures, when he sowed his wild oats.

Danquah was a prolific writer. He produced two great books namely, Akan Laws and Customs (1928), and Akan Doctrine of God (1944). His works are still consulted by students of Sociology, Law, Cultural Studies, among others. While a student in London from 1921 to 1927, he became the Editor-President of the West African Students Union (WASU), to which Nkrumah also belonged during his brief stay in the UK after his exit from the USA.

In 1934, while on a petition delegation to London, he researched at the British Museum and came up with the name Ghana for the then Gold Coast. He researched and discovered that Ghanaians are descended from the ancient empire of Ghana which flourished between the fourth and twelve centuries at the Niger bend, near present day Timbucktoo in Mali. Of course, that fact was known by many people but it was he who championed the cause for the name Ghana to be adopted at independence.

The name Ghana must have come from the Guan name Gyan or Djan. Out of the name Gyan, we have anglicized versions like Ghunney, Ghansah, Ghartey, among others. In 1954, after he lost elections massively to the CPP, while running on the ticket of the UGCC, he was invited to New York by the UN to receive the Bryony Mumford Writing Fellowship, which had tenure of 3 months. When he arrived back in the country, he was conferred with the title of Twafohene by the Abuakwa State, with the stool name of Barima Kwame Kyeretwie Dankwa. Among his illustrious accomplishments was his unyielding fight to have the University of Ghana established in 1948. The British had proposed the establishment of only one university for the whole of West Africa at Ibadan in Nigeria, but Danquah refused.

I wonder why we have no Danquah Hall at Legon or Danquah University of Constitutional and Conservative Studies (DUCCS). ( I was an undergraduate at Legon Hall, University of Ghana from 1975 to 1978). It was Danquah who fought for the establishment of the Cocoa Marketing Board (CMB) in 1947. It was Danquah who vigorously canvassed the people of Asante and the then Northern Territories to join the Gold Coast Colony to become what we know today as modern Ghana. Of course, Nkrumah also did his bit by using the 1956 Plebiscite to cause the UN to recognise parts of Trans-Volta Togoland to become part of modern day Ghana.

Nkrumah was vehemently opposed by secessionists such as Dr R.G. Armattoe and S. G. Kofi Antor, who were considered implacable rebels and dissidents. Danquah believed strongly in liberal democracy, hence his idea of federalism and a ministerial system of government for Ghana. However, even the British did not buy into his federalist views for a small country like Ghana.

However, Nkrumah was diametrically opposed to the idea of federation as he felt that a unitary state was best for Ghana. At a point in time, Danquah felt that his dream had been stolen by the radical Nkrumah, hence his implacable and fierce resistance to Nkrumah. Danquah joined the National Liberation Movement (NLM) and later the Ghana Congress Party (GCP). The NLM was dubbed a federalist or Matemeho party because of their political tactics which were sometimes deemed and perceived to be ultra-violent, hence the offshoot of the ‘All die be die’ mantra of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo of the current NPP.

Danquah worked with people like Sir Arku Korsah (first Ghanaian Chief Justice) and Kojo Thompson to produce a 400 page draft constitution for the Gold Coast before the advent of the Burns Constitution in the late 40s. It is proper and befitting for us to honour our illustrious leaders and pioneers. Today, we have Danquah Circle in Accra, and the annual Danquah Memorial Lectures at the University of Cape Coast. At one time, our distinguished son of the soil, Busumbrum Kofi Annan, offered the opinion that Nkrumah’s brash radicalism cost Ghana a lot. However, opinions diverge as to the propriety of Nkrumah’s lofty Pan-Africanist ideals and ideas of the full emancipation of blacks around the globe.

Perhaps, Kofi Annan would have loved Ghana to have gone the way of Botswana where Sir Seretse Khama worked steadily and closely with the former colonial master till the country attained independence in 1966. Botswana then was a very poor desert country, until much later when diamonds were discovered by the De Beers Group from South Africa for it to become a success story in Africa. Perhaps, the spirit of the times did not fit the environment of gradualism or incrementalism which Danquah and his colleagues had advocated.

Whatever the faults of Nkrumah were, he was human and fallible, and as Shakespeare once said, ‘to err is human, to forgive divine’, we need to rise from our ashes like the Phoenix bird and wax strong as a lodestar nation or the African Renaissance. The august body, the African Union, and the BBC, among other respectable global institutions, have all eulogised Nkrumah as the greatest African, and we respect their judgement. Many great academics from around the world have also said so, so who is the so-called ‘Dr’ Samuel Adjei Sarfo, JD, to make bones about these independent and impartial non-Ghanaian verdict on Nkrumah? Or who is Kwame Okoampa Ahoofe Jr to pooh-pooh the laurels of Nkrumah? Is it the case of a prophet having no honour in his own country or among some of his own nationals? Such is the height of ingratitude and the high price paid for being a patriot and pan-Africanist.

To me, I go by the Fante proverb that says that those who have cotton wool sticking out of their anuses should not join others in playing the dangerous game of jumping fires. Power games are always dangerous and Danquah sadly enough paid the price of playing that game, leading to his untimely demise in the cold and dank torturous dungeons of Nsawam Maximum Security Prison. I knew one brilliant lawyer and merchant from near my mother’s house in Winneba, indeed a distant relative, who was also incarcerated there at Nsawam, one Mr Baiden Amissah, alias Kweku Damboley. Nkrumah and Danquah are gone and they stridently played their noble parts in their time. Let us let the spirit of the dead lie in peace.

What role are we the descendants and current generation of Ghanaians playing to lift high the flag of Ghana? Marie Correlli in Wormwood once wrote, No wise man stops to brood over the past, for, the past is a land of might-have- been where there rains perpetual tears of regret and it is a bleak and lugubrious prospect’(paraphrased).

We will be wise to learn lessons from the past and move on as one collective body to exploit our synergistic energies rather than drive wedges of division and diatribe among us, spending useless hours splitting hairs and looking for needles in haystacks, ad nauseum, and comparing and contrasting achievements and misdeeds to no useful avail. You read history of Britain, France, Italy, America, inter alia, and you get wiser. Only sobs and puerile, infantile, juvenile, and bantamweight academic lowbrows and dimwits like DR SAS and cohort/clique dwell on the trivialities and negatives of the past to pollute the body polity in Ghana. To such miscreants and diabolical nation-wreckers, I say enough is enough. They know nothing of the past as they write their treatises based on hearsay and wild speculations.

It was much later when diamonds were discovered by the De Beers Group from South Africa that today; Botswana’s success story in Africa is well documented. At the time of Ghana’s independence, it was estimated that a princely sum of 270 million pounds was left in the state coffers. Who would doubt that Nkrumah did not manage our economy prudently? Well, posterity is the judge. An apocryphal anecdote states that after Nkrumah’s overthrow, late President Gnassingbe Eyadema of Togo came on a state visit immediately after Nkrumah’s overthrow. He was taken on a conducted tour of Akosombo, Tema Harbour and industrial estate, Tema Motorway, inter alia. It is said after all that he saw, he interjected, ‘ If Kwame Nkrumah accomplished all these things, why then did you overthrow him?’ I hope the then NLC junta might have explained themselves away on some flimsy excuses. Well, that is hearsay and not corroborated.

However, had Ghana followed Danquah’s conservative and constitutional step-by-step process, Ghana’s independence could have delayed by 10 years or more.

Danquah was British- trained while Nkrumah was American- trained as they had their tertiary education respectively in Britain and the USA. Thus, Nkrumah evinced the American traits of good salesmanship, marketing, theatrics, radicalism and love for adventure. On the other hand, Danquah wanted everything to be negotiated and processed through the court procedure of due process, or through formalized rigmarole bureaucratic channels. Thus, we can now understand the diametrically opposed strategies and natures of Danquah and Nkrumah. If the two had collaborated, Ghana’s history would have taken quite a different trajectory. However, what is writ is writ and fate cannot be changed.

As I write this article, E.T Mensah’s highlife tune rings in my ears, giving me nostalgic feelings of those politically stormy days when we used to chant as children, the words, ‘CPP obeko Assembly, Dombo Krakye, Orennko Assembly’ ,or ‘Odombo, Odombo, Dombo-soo me’. E.T Mensah sang, ‘Am for you, Titi, Am for you, I dey waiting Mama, I dey waiting Papa, Am for you. Am for you, Titi am for you.’ Look out for the next tribute to Osagyefo Kantamanto Oseeadeayo Kwame Nkrumah.

References

1. http:www.articles.ghananation.com/themes/gnation

2. www.ghanaweb.history

Compiled by Kwesi Atta Sakyi

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