Who is Dr. Kwame Nkrumah?

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Created on Thursday, 19 September 2013 00:00

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Who is Dr. Kwame Nkrumah?

Kwame Nkrumah 21 September 1909 - 27 April 1972, was an influential 20th century advocate of Pan-Africanism, and the leader of Ghana and its predecessor state, the Gold Coast, from 1952 to 1966.

In 1909, Kwame Nkrumah was born to Madam Nyaniba in Nkroful, Gold Coast Nkrumah graduated from the prestigious Achimota School in Accra in 1930, studied at a Roman Catholic Seminary, and taught at a Catholic school in Axim. In 1935 he left Ghana for the United States, receiving a BA from Lincoln University, Pennsylvania in 1939, where he pledged the Mu Chapter of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc., and received an STB (Bachelor of Sacred Theology) in 1942. Nkrumah earned a Master of Science in education from the University of Pennsylvania in 1942, and a Master of Arts in philosophy the following year.

While lecturing in political science at Lincoln he was elected president of the African Students Organization of America and Canada. As an undergraduate at Lincoln he participated in at least one student theater production and published an essay on European government in Africa in the student newspaper,The Lincolnian.

During his time in the United States, Nkrumah preached at black Presbyterian Churches in Philadelphia and New York City. He read books about politics and divinity, and tutored students in philosophy. Nkrumah encountered the ideas of Marcus Garvey, and in 1943 met and began a lengthy correspondence with Trinidadian Marxist C.L.R. James, Russian expatriate Raya Dunayevskaya, and Chinese-American Grace Lee Boggs, all of whom were members of a US based Trotskyist intellectual cohort. Nkrumah later credited James with teaching him 'how an underground movement worked'.

He arrived in London in May 1945 intending to study at the LSE. After meeting with George Padmore, he helped organize the Fifth Pan-African Congress in Manchester, England.

Then he founded the West African National Secretariat to work for the decolonization of Africa. Nkrumah served as Vice-President of the West African Students' Union (WASU).

Over his lifetime, Nkrumah was awarded honorary doctorates by Lincoln University, Moscow State University; Cairo University in Cairo, Egypt; Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland; Humboldt University in the former East Berlin; and other universities. Return to the Gold Coast.

In the autumn of 1947, Nkrumah was invited to serve as the General Secretary to the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) under Joseph B. Danquah. This political convention was exploring paths to independence. Nkrumah accepted the position and sailed for the Gold Coast. After brief stops in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and the Ivory Coast, he arrived in the Gold Coast in December 1947.

In February 1948, police fired on African ex-servicemen protesting the rising cost of living. The shooting spurred riots in Accra, Kumasi, and elsewhere. The government suspected the UGCC was behind the protests and arrested Nkrumah and other party leaders. Realizing their error, the British soon released the convention leaders. After his imprisonment by the colonial government, Nkrumah emerged as the leader of the youth movement in 1948.

After his release, Nkrumah hitchhiked around the country. He proclaimed that the Gold Coast needed "self-government now", and built a large power base. Cocoa farmers rallied to his cause because they disagreed with British policy to contain swollen shoot disease. He invited women to participate in the political process at a time when women's suffrage was new to Africa. The trade unions also allied with his movement. By 1949, he organized these groups into a new political party: The Convention People's Party.

The British convened a selected commission of middle class Africans to draft of a new constitution that would give Ghana more self-government. Under the new constitution, only those with sufficient wage and property would be allowed to vote. Nkrumah organized a "People's Assembly" with CPP party members, youth, trade unionists, farmers, and veterans. They proposed called universal franchise without property qualifications, a separate house of chiefs, and self-governing status under the Statute of Westminster. These amendments, known as the Constitutional Proposals of October 1949, were rejected by the colonial administration.

When the colonial administrator's rejected the People's Assembly's recommendations, Nkrumah organized a "Positive Action" campaign in January 1950, including civil disobedience, non-cooperation, boycotts, and strikes. The colonial administration arrested Nkrumah and many CPP supporters, and he was sentenced to three years in prison.

Facing international protests and internal resistance, the British decided to leave the Gold Coast. Britain organized the first general election to be held under universal franchise on 5-10 February 1951. Though in jail, Nkrumah's CPP was elected by a landslide taking 34 out of 38 elected seats in the Legislative Assembly. Nkrumah was released from prison on 12 February, and summoned by the British Governor Charles Arden-Clarke, and asked to form a government on the 13th.

The new Legislative Assembly met on 20 February, with Nkrumah as Leader of Government Business, and E.C. Quist as President of the Assembly. A year later, the constitution was amended to provide for a Prime Minister on 10 March 1952, and Nkrumah was elected to that post by a secret ballot in the Assembly, 45 to 31, with eight abstentions on 21 March. He presented his "Motion of Destiny" to the Assembly, requesting independence within the British Commonwealth "as soon as the necessary constitutional arrangements are made" on 10 July 1953, and that body approved it. Independence.

As a leader of this government, Nkrumah faced three serious challenges: first, to learn to govern; second, to unify the nation of Ghana from the four territories of the Gold Coast; third, to win his nation's complete independence from the United Kingdom. Nkrumah was successful at all three goals. Within six years of his release from prison, he was the leader of an independent nation.

At 12 a.m. on 6 March 1957, Nkrumah declared Ghana independent. Nkrumah was hailed as "Osagyefo" - which means "redeemer" in the Twi language.[6] On 6 March 1960, Nkrumah announced plans for a new constitution which would make Ghana a republic. The draft included a provision to surrender Ghanaian sovereignty to a union of African states. On 19, 23, and 27 April 1960 a presidential election and plebiscite on the constitution were held. The constitution was ratified and Nkrumah was elected president over J. B. Danquah, the UP candidate, 1,016,076 to 124,623. In 1961, Nkrumah laid the first stones in the foundation of the Kwame Nkrumah Ideological Institute created to train Ghanaian civil servants as well as promote Pan-Africanism. In 1963, Nkrumah was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize by the Soviet Union. Ghana became a charter member of the Organization of African Unity in 1963.

The Gold Coast had been among the wealthiest and most socially advanced areas in Africa, with schools, railways, hospitals, social security and an advanced economy. Under Nkrumah's leadership, Ghana adopted some socialistic policies and practices. Nkrumah created a welfare system, started various community programs, and established schools. Politics He generally took a non-aligned Marxist perspective on economics, and believed capitalism had malignant effects that were going to stay with Africa for a long time. Although he was clear on distancing himself from the African socialism of many of his contemporaries; Nkrumah argued that socialism was the system that would best accommodate the changes that capitalism had brought, while still respecting African values.

He specifically addresses these issues and his politics in a 1967 essay entitled "African Socialism Revisited": "We know that the traditional African society was founded on principles of egalitarianism. In its actual workings, however, it had various shortcomings. Its humanist impulse, nevertheless, is something that continues to urge us towards our all-African socialist reconstruction.

We postulate each man to be an end in himself, not merely a means; and we accept the necessity of guaranteeing each man equal opportunities for his development. The implications of this for socio-political practice have to be worked out scientifically, and the necessary social and economic policies pursued with resolution. Any meaningful humanism must begin from egalitarianism and must lead to objectively chosen policies for safeguarding and sustaining egalitarianism.

Hence, socialism. Hence, also, scientific socialism."[7] Nkrumah was also perhaps best known politically for his strong commitment to and promotion of Pan-Africanism. Having been inspired by the writings and his relationships with black intellectuals like Marcus Garvey, W. E. B. Du Bois, and George Padmore. With perhaps Nkrumah's biggest success in this area coming with his significant influence in the founding of the Organization of African Unity. Economics Nkrumah attempted to rapidly industrialize Ghana's economy.

He reasoned that if Ghana escaped the colonial trade system by reducing dependence on foreign capital, technology, and material goods, it could become truly independent. Unfortunately, industrialization hurt the country's cocoa sector. Many economic projects he initiated were unsuccessful, or with delayed benefits. The Akosombo Dam was expensive, but today produces most of Ghana's hydroelectric power. Nkrumah's policies did not free Ghana from dependence on Western imports.

By the time he was deposed in 1966, Ghana had fallen from one of the richest countries in Africa, to one of the poorest. Decline and fall to power. In 1958 Nkrumah introduced legislation to restrict various freedoms in Ghana. After the Gold Miners' Strike of 1955, Nkrumah introduced the Trade Union Act, which made strikes illegal. When he suspected opponents in parliament of plotting against him, he wrote the Preventive Detention Act that made it possible for his administration to arrest and detain anyone charged with treason without due process of law in the judicial system.

When the railway workers went on strike in 1961, Nkrumah ordered strike leaders and opposition politicians arrested under the Trade Union Act of 1958. While Nkrumah had organized strikes just a few years before, he now opposed industrial democracy because it conflicted with rapid industrial development. He told the unions that their days as advocates for the safety and just compensation of miners were over, and that their new job was to work with management to mobilize human resources. Wages must give way to patriotic duty because the good of the nation superseded the good of individual workers, NKrumah's administration contended.

The Detention Act led to widespread disaffection with Nkrumah's administration. Some of his associates used the law to arrest innocent people to acquire their political offices and business assets. Advisers close to Nkrumah became reluctant to question policies for fear that they might be seen as opponents. When the clinics ran out of pharmaceuticals, no one notified him. Some people believed that he no longer cared. Police came to resent their role in society. Nkrumah disappeared from public view out of a justifiable fear of assassination.

In 1964, he proposed a constitutional amendment making the CPP the only legal party and himself president for life of both nation and party. The amendment passed with over 99 percent of the vote an implausibly high total that could have only been obtained through fraud. In any event, Ghana had effectively been a one-party state since becoming a republic, but the amendment transformed Nkrumah's presidency into a de facto legal dictatorship. Nkrumah wanted Ghana to have modern armed forces, so he acquired aircraft and ships, and introduced conscription. He also gave military support to those fighting the Smith administration in Zimbabwe, then called Rhodesia.

In February 1966, while Nkrumah was on a state visit to North Vietnam and China, his government was overthrown in a military coup, which was backed by the CIA.[8][9][10] Today, Nkrumah is one of the most respected leaders in African history. In 2000, he was voted Africa's man of the millennium by listeners to the BBC World Service. Exile, death and tributes Nkrumah never returned to Ghana, but he continued to push for his vision of African unity. He lived in exile in Conakry, Guinea, as the guest of President Ahmed Sékou Touré, who made him honorary co-president of the country.

He read, wrote, corresponded, gardened, and entertained guests. Despite retirement from public office, he was still frightened of western intelligence agencies. When his cook died, he feared that someone would poison him, and began hoarding food in his room. He suspected that foreign agents were going through his mail, and lived in constant fear of abduction and assassination.

In failing health, he flew to Bucharest, Romania, for medical treatment in August 1971. He died of skin cancer in April 1972 at the age of 62. Nkrumah was buried in a tomb in the village of his birth, Nkroful, Ghana. While the tomb remains in Nkroful, his remains were transferred to a large national memorial tomb and park in Accra. Wikipedia

Source: ModernGhana, 21 September 2009

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The NPP Marks 21st Anniversary

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Category: History

Created on Friday, 23 August 2013 00:00

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The NPP Marks 21st Anniversary

{sidebar id=10 align=right}The New Patriotic Party (NPP)- the main Opposition Party in Ghana, which traces its roots to the UGCC of 1947, is 21 years today in contemporary politics of Ghana.

Find attached below a political speech delivered by Professor Mike Ocqauaye- the former Ghana Ambassador to India, under the Kufuor-led NPP administration, on behalf of the party.

Professor Mike Ocquaye; was until 07 January 2013, the NPP Member of Parliament for Dome-Kwabenya, in the Greater Accra Region of Ghana.

Professor Mike Ocquaye, voluntarily, vacated his parliamentary seat, and was internally contested for between his son- Mike Ocqauye Jnr and and Adwoa Sarfo, both legal practitioners.

Adwoa Sarfo won the primaries and and went on to retain the seat for the NPP.

We mention in passing that the current Dome-Kwabeny MP- Adwoa Sarfo, might be remebered for her critical oversight role in the recounting of ballots in her constituency, which probably motivated the NPP leadership in challenging the outcome of the presidential election result of 09 December 2012 which went in favour of incumbent president- John Dramani Mahama.

The Verdict of that electoral petition of 28 December 2012; which travelled for some 48 weeks, is due to be decided on 29th August 2013, by the 9-member Supreme Court Judges, who sat on the case throughout the hearing.

The NPP Anniversary, attracted all-shades of the political-divide, including the Chairmen and the General-Secreataries of the leading ideological leanings in the country.

Whereas the general worries and anticipation of the Ghanaian appear to be peace and power-sharing government, the focus of the NPP's keynote address, had centred on History & Tradition.

It remains unclear to JusticeGhana, as to how the said Power-sharing Government or should we say the Union Government Concept, which General I.K. Acheampong of the SMC, propagated in the 1970s but was scorned and rejected, is going to be achieved in this abrasive ideological landscape.

But suffice to add that, the stone that the builders rejected, appears to becoming the head-corner-stone, of an overbearing structure struggling under an unmeasured concrete-roofing of the kind.

...You might have thought that: After All, Acheampong was overly, Not far from the Truth?

READ The NPP: History and Tradition

JusticeGhana

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Kwame Nkrumah misfounded Ghana

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Created on Saturday, 07 September 2013 00:00

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Kwame Nkrumah misfounded Ghana

By: AHUMAH OCANSEY

“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge” (Hosea 4:6)

{sidebar id=10 align=right}THIS essay has been prompted by an introspection of Ghana’s fortunes since independence and the celebration of the Jubilee this year. The writer seeks to answer the question why there appears to be “something missing” somewhere in the scheme of affairs in Ghana’s development.

Against the background of immense natural assets, a talented human resource, international goodwill and a relatively small population, Ghana is still bewildered with basic developmental problems, pervasive’ corruption which all the liberators, redeemers and revolutionaries have not succeeded in erasing. It is also has a future which is fine on paper but which neither the governments nor the people can talk about with certainly and with faith. In fact, Ghanaians are apprehensive about the future of their country. What is that “something missing”?

The major premise of this essay is that Kwame Nkrumah, the first President and Founder of the Republic of Ghana, in light of his philosophical and ideological interpretation of life, expressed in his writing. Consciencism, committed some radical errors in the foundation of Ghana and those errors have determined Ghana’s economic and political life till this moment.

Nkrumah founded Ghana on the negative polarity of materialism, as expounded in philosophical consciencism, an ideology that is Marxist and which interprets life from a materialistic perspective. By founding Ghana on such ideological principle, Nkrumah excluded the positive polarity of spirituality and thereby predetermined Ghana to a course of repeated failures, circumambulation and selfish, acquisitive materialism. Self first, tribe second, nation last!

It follows, as a corollary, that for Ghana to chart a new course a holistic ideology in which the spiritual and material polarities are made co-existent in their right proportions.

This essay is in two chapters. The first chapter analyses Nkrumah’s philosophical consciencism, in the light of Biblical knowledge and scientific findings bearing on Nkrumah’s thesis about the origin of life.

The first chapter looks at Matter as Causation, and Categorical Conversion – all from Consciencism. The second chapter looks at the application of Nkrumah’s philosophy within the context of nation events and its influence on the nation. The conclusion follows.

Matter as causation

In Consciencism, Nkrumah dealt with the age-old concern of the basis of creation. In philosophical discourses, we speak of monism and dualism. Monists (from the Latin, mono, means one) are those who hold that the world came into existence from one principal element. Thales, a Greek philosopher, said that the world came from water.

Plato postulated that the world of Ideals was the ground of reality from which creation emerged. Dualists like the British, John Locke (1632-1704) and French, Ren? Descartes (1596-1650), held that the world comprised both spirit and matter (mind and body).

Nkrumah discards these view points as inadequate theories to explain the phenomenal world, and rather postulates his philosophical consciencism. What is this? Nkrumah says: “Philosophical consciencism is that philosophical stand point which, taking its stand from the present content of the African conscience, indicates the way in which progress is forged out of the conflict. Its basis is in materialism is the absolute imum assertion of materialism is the absolute and independent existence of matter) Consciencism, pg 79).

Nkrumah justifies his stance by saying that whereas he accepts the existence of spiritual realities, he does not accept contrary, they are secondary, and dependent on matter. He described matter as “a plenum of forces in tension” (plenum means space is completely filled with matter, there is no vacuum). Because it is a plenum of forces, matter is capable of spontaneous self-motion, that is, self-creative. However, matter does not exist alone; it exists alongside spirit, but matter is primary.

Philosophical consciencism does not asset the sole reality of mater (ibid pg. 88).

By Nkrumah’s reasoning, matter provides the ground for the emergence of mind. This is because, he adds, mind cannot exist independently of matter; its reality is secondary, and dependent on matter.

What Nkrumah meant by his statements is that the basis of life is found in the material world. The material is concrete. It is real. It is ascertainable in its constituents.

For example, common salt, sodium chloride, is reducible to sodium and chlorine. These two elements exist by themselves. They are primary. They have their own independent life. However, when combined, they form a different category of thing called salt, which is a secondary product. So, by this example, Nkrumah seeks to demonstrate the two components of life, the material and the spiritual, with the material (body) being first, and the spiritual (mind) being second.

In other words, for Nkrumah, the creature came before the creator!

Here, the battle begins. The antithesis of Nkrumah’s assertion of the primacy of matter is found in the Biblical account of creation. It says:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made (John 1: 1-3).

There are two fundamental principles here. The first is that the spiritual is the primordial ground of being: “In the beginning was the Word…the Word was God”, The Word represents the uncreated potency of God – the Divine Power. But God is a Spirit (Jn. 3: 19-21), and thus antedates all things Material life, as postulated in Consciencism could not, therefore, be absolute, independent, and prior to God, or the Word. In fact, the primary of God, as spirit is emphatically stated in Gen. 1:1: “In the begging, God created heaven and earth”.

The second principle is that creation – “all things” - came about through the causative spiritual force-the Word. The totality of its creative power is emphasized in “without him was not anything made that was made”. Since nothing exists outside God, and God is a spirit, it means the spiritual (mind) came first, out of which matter (body) emerged second.

The Biblical account of creation overthrows Nkrumah’s assertion of matter as the primary causation of life. In other words, by failing to factor in the reality of the Divine, Nkrumah failed to explain satisfactorily the very basis of the material foundation of creation.. That is to say, what gave birth to the material? The problem which confronted Nkrumah could be described as the Gordian knot of philosophers and scientists: How to account for the creation of the world. Nkrumah perceived the problem as a philosopher, not as a scientist.

The scientific world was awakened from its slumber with the shattering declaration by Charles Darwin that life evolved from simple life forms, through the transition of incomplete bones and organs, till, over several millions of years, man evolved from higher apes. His book was The Origin of Species, published in 1859. Extensive scholarship and scientific investigations of Darwin’s hypotheses in the book were made. And the conclusion was that evolution does not, and cannot, explain the complexity and perfection of life on earth.

Evolutionist, Francis Hitching, in his book, The Neck of the Giraffe, 1982, wrote:

“In three crucial areas where the modern evolution theory can be tested, it has failed. The fossil record reveals a pattern of evolutionary leaps rather than gradual change. Genes are a powerful stabilizing mechanism whose main function is to prevent new forms evolving. Random step-by-step mutations at the molecular level cannot explain the organized and growing complexity of life”.

Other scientific attempts to explain the world have been postulated on the emergence of life from a chemical soup of primary elements, especially hydrogen and nitrogen, and others, forming increasingly complex molecules out of which life emerged. And yet other scientists talk of the world merging from a Big Bang, when some tremendous explosion from a centre of density and intense heat led to the universes being created.

The scientific literature on the origins of life is immense, and very fascinating.

Whichever scientific theory of the universe is chosen is bound to suffer from the limitations of materialism: How did the very first cause come about for all else to follow?

Nkrumah overcomes that problem through logical reductionism, in which he reasons that since an endless progression of causes cannot terminate in a causeless cause (uncreated creator), as some philosophers hold, it is more plausible to deny an ultimate cause for the world. In other words, the world is its own genesis and finality.

The day logic is fine for purposes of intellectual discourse, but it must be said that an empirical justification of the world is illogical and question-begging, because that is the very problem raised in the question. How did the world come about?

Nkrumah’s materialistic ideology leads to the preposterous conclusion that since proof of the world’s creation can be found within the world, and not outside it, God cannot, and, therefore, does not exist, as God is not empirically verifiable. Hear him.

Some people say that it is improbable that nothing should exist, that the statement that nothing exists cannot he conceived as true. But it cannot be inferred from the non-vacuity of the universe that some given object will always exist. It is therefore impossible to infer the existence of God from the fact that something must always exist (ibid. pg. 9).

Incidentally, the British biologist, Thomas Huxley (1825 1895), coined the word agnostic from the Greek, agnostoi theoi, (unknown mate cause (God) and the essential nature of things are unknown or unknowable”. Nkrumah could therefore be called on agnostic!

The issue of first cause and God’s existence had arisen inevitably from the several scientific enquiries into life, and discoveries knowledge of the universe. And when all the literature has been reviewed, the common denominator is that scientists realize there is a mysterious factor in creation which their scientific knowledge cannot fathom. The literature available is copious.

British Astronomer, Sir Fred Hoyle, who spent decades studying the universe, came to the conclusion that rather then accepting the fantastically small probability of life having arisen through the blind forces of nature, it seemed better to suppose that the “origin of life was a deliberate intellectual act” (Lecture at California Institute of Technology). That “intellectual act” was an act of God!

Former American astronaut, John Glenn, contemplated the awesome beauty and orderliness of the universe, the predictable movements of the galaxies in their orbits, and asked”: “Could this have just happened? Was it an accident that a bunch of flotsam and jetsam (the several bodies floating in space, like goods thrown out of a ship, floating on the sea) suddenly started making these orbits of its own accord? I can’t believe that … some Power put all this into orbit and keeps it there”. That “Power” is God!

German-born American physicist and rocket expert, Wernher von Braun, stated in laws of the universe are so precise that we to the moon and can time the flight with the precision of fraction of a minute. These laws must have been set by somebody”. That “somebody” is God!

Last example, Scientists who have studied the nature and functioning of the human brain are equally stunned by their discoveries. Says Henry F. Osborn, an Anthropologist: “The human brain is the most marvelous and mysterious object in the universe”.

And American Neurosurgeon, Dr. Robert J. White, remarked:

“I am left with no choice but to acknowledge the existence of a superior Intellect, responsible for the design and development of the incredible brain-mind relationship-something far beyond man’s capacity to understand…I have to believe all this had an intelligent beginning that, Someone made it happen”. (Reader’s Digest, September 1978). That “Someone” is God!

These declarations by scientists point incontrovertibly to the existence of God and, placed against Nkrumah’s philosophical tenants in Consciencism, serve to define Nkrumah as an atheist!

The atheistic outlook of Nkrumah springs from his inadequate comprehension of the totality of created matter. If he had reasoned as a scientist, whom he was not, it would have impressed on him that the tools of scientific enquiry have been unable to fathom everything in creation because the Intelligence behind creation, God, by its very nature, is not reducible to scientific analysis and to empirical proof.

The problem of God’s existence, along with creation, had long been anticipated in the Bible, and an answer provided: For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all who hold the truth in unrighteousness. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, been understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse (Romans 1:20).

Nkrumah’s views, as stated in Consciencism, derived their coloration from the teachings of Marx and Lenin, which he described as “the most searching and penetrating analysis of economic imperialism”. Marxism was, however materialistic, and by embracing it as an ideological weapon in his relentless attack on Western imperialism and colonialism, Nkrumah rejected almost all the economic and Christian principles that the West stood for. Nkrumah dumped their “God” into a philosophical dust bin!

Christianity, for example, suffers from both miscomprehension and interpretation from a Marxist perspective, as the ideology reduces spiritual and non-material matters to the level of empiricism, and finding it full of unanswered questions, rejects the Christian world view as absurd. Thus, for instance, Nkrumah sees as unsound and impractical Jesus Christ’s admonition that we “lay up for ourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal” (Matt 6:20).

Nkrumah comments as follows: The contradiction rakes effect when with the gaze steadfastly fixed upon things “outside” the world, the requirement of earthly life which, in fact, conditions existence of every human being, suffer neglect.

Nkrumah went on to say that the dialectical contradictions between the “inside” (the world), and the “outside” (the spiritual), explains Marx’s condemnation of religion as an instrument of exploitation in the hands of the colonialists and imperialists, because it operates as an opium, which takes the mind off the things of life.

It makes sense to say one must be concerned with practical considerations of life, as religious extremism and unrealism are foolish and self-destructive. Nkrumah was, however, too mundane to understand the finer and deeper meaning of Christ’s advice.

Was it not the same Christ who fed five thousand people, and produced wine at a wedding reception? Jesus was a realist. He fed people. He paid his taxes. He healed the siek. What Jesus Christ was laying emphasis on was the ephemeral or transitory nature of materialism, as distinct from the permanence of spiritual realities. This is so because spirit is the basis of the material. Nkrumah could not, and did not, accept this truth.

That was his problem!

Categorical conversion

Our next consideration is to discuss a vital plank of Consciencism: Categorical Convention. You would recall that Nkrumah admits the existence of matter and spirit as components of creation, though matter has primary in his philosophy. This dualism of matter and spirit, says Nkrumah, are convertible from one state to the other. He writes:

“By categorical conversion is meant the transforming of one category into another: The production of one category by using one or more categories which are different from the one produced”. By way of elaboration he says again: “By categorical convergence of self-consciousness from what is not self-conscious, such a thing as emergence of mind from matter”. (ibid. pg. 20).

I must confess a singular inability to fully understand categorical conversion, as formulated by Nkrumah. If Nkrumah had been content with the first definition of categorical conversion, as stated, it might be possible to substantiate his assertion by scientific principle, but immediately the second definition comes in, we begin to flounder in a whirlpool of improbabilities.

Let’s take the first definition. Back in 1905, Albert Einstein had established the pivotal scientific principle of the relationship between matter and energy, in the famous expression E=mc (Energy equals mass multiplied by the speed of light squared). By this formula scientists could calculate that every second the sun converts about 564 million tons of helium. This means some 4 million tons of matter are transformed into solar energy, a portion of which sustains life on earth.

The atomic and hydrogen bombs are also illustrations of the transformation of matter into energy.

Scientists have also succeeded in converting energy into matter. Under the Swiss mountains, and in underground laboratories in the US, huge particle accelerators have been installed in which subatomic particles collide at fantastic speeds, creating matter, heavier particles, in the process.

Remarking on the great achievements of science in this field of quantum physics, Nobel laureate physicist Dr. Carlo Rubbia, said: We’re repeating one of the miracles of the universe-transforming energy into matter”.

So, in effect, Nkrumah’s categorical conversion is a reality within quantum physics; but this is in the realm of matter only. Nkrumah admitted this in his statement that “matter and energy are two distinct, but, as science has shown, not unconnected or irreducible categories The interreducibility of matter and energy offers a model for categorical conversion” (ibid pg. 21).

However, by going further to advance the theory of self-consciousness merging from the non self-conscious, or the emergence of mind from matter, Nkrumah put us to great task trying to comprehend what he meant by that conversion.

This position is so preposterous I don’t know who will aid Nkrumah to explain himself to the world. How could that which is not produce that which is? I should say that Nkrumah’s stance is so untenable we should dismiss it without further ado.

In conclusion, let me restate the essentials of our discussion. From Nkrumah’s Consciencism, I have sought to establish that the ideological matrix from which Ghana emerged was rooted in materialism, and that Nkrumah’s outlook discounted God as a factor in the affairs of men. By upholding matter as the basis of life Nkrumah contradicted Biblical account of creation, and its Christian ideology, and lay himself upon to a materialistic interplay of forces in the development of Ghana.

*Source:Daily Graphic- Thursday, October 25, 2007

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The De-Nkrumanization Of Ghana

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Category: History

Created on Sunday, 18 August 2013 00:00

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The De-Nkrumanization Of Ghana

The Danquah- Busia Group, The National Liberation Council & The De-Nkrumanization Of Ghana.

{sidebar id=10 align=right}The title of my feature article of Saturday August 17th, should have read "HOW BUSIA DAMAGED NKRUMAH & GHANA IN U.S.A".Sorry for the "typo" however, the content is clear. I will attempt to let readers know today how the Danqua-Busia group and the National Liberation Council tried the de-Nkrumahnization of Ghana.

My believe is that, the NPP youth,especially their communicators at the various radio stations do not know their own history and how the United Party was formed.

After several attempts by the D/B group to discredit and destabilize Nkrumah's government, Nkrumah's battle with the opposition reached the highest point, when on August 26,1957,the CPP government introduced a bill in the National Assembly to abolish the posts of European Chief Regional Commissioners and their assistants.The purpose of the bill was to replace those officers with Ghanaian Regional Commissioners to allow Ghanaians keep in touch with the central government. Busia reacted angrily to the bill which he described as " objectionable".

The then minister of interior,Krobo Edusei bluntly threatened to arrest and try members of the opposition. This threat together with another to ban all tribal parties came timely for Busia where he immediately summoned leading representatives of the National Liberation Movement, the Northern Peoples Association of Accra,the Wassaw Youth and the Ashanti Youth Leagues to a meeting on October 3 in Kumasi.

After a second meeting in Accra,they agreed to merge into a "United Party "(UP) with Busia as their leader. The new party was inaugurated at Bukom Square, Accra, at a rally presided over by Busia.This is how the UP was formed. To the NPP youth,this information and education is free. Nkrumah's progressive forward ever and backward never government was overthrown on February 24,1966.The armed forces in conjunction with the police formed a junta called the National Liberation Council (NLC) with General J.A.Ankrah as the Chairman. General Afrifa who had promised Busia a safe passage home the previous year lived to his word.

As a student in Sandhurst,Afrifa had heard so much about Busia's academic achievements together with his criticisms of Nkrumah such that he Afrifa resolved to do whatever he could to make Busia's return home possible,hence Afrifa's collaboration with Colonel Kotoka in the 1966 coup. In an interview by BBC after the coup,Busia said "he was too much of a politician to say openly that he plotted the overthrow Nkrumah's government but obviously tried to give the impression that he had played an important part in planning the the military and police action.

Interestingly,within a month of the announcement of the coup, Busia left Oxford for Ghana where he received a tumultuous welcome from his supporters on March 19,1966.After consolidating its grip on political power, the new military regime in June, 1966,created the "political committee of the National Liberation Council " with Edward Akuffo-Addo and Busia as Chairman and Vice Chairman respectively. Other members included William Ofori Atta and J.A Braimah who were all strong members of the old UP was an indication of the new military regime's desire to replace Nkrumah and his CPP with the opposition. The rapidity with which leaders and supporters of Busia's United Party were appointed to powerful political positions was an indication of the intentions of the NLC.

The NLC,therefore gradually set the stage for Busia to climb the post-Nkrumah political ladder. On September 26,1966,Edward Akuffo Addo replaced Julius Sarkodie Addo as Chief Justice. The chairmanship of the political committee shifted to Busia who became the most powerful civilian in the NLC government. He went on foreign trips on behalf of the government or accompanied NLC members on such. Busia was so diabolic by all standards,hungry for political power at all cost,a similar trend that has characterized Akuffo Addo in Ghana today. On March 30,1967,as the chairman of the political committee, Busia called for an early return to civilian rule. Consistent with his desire for political power in the pre- independence period, ,Busia approached the NLC to handover power to him,according to former NLC vice chairman, JWK Harlley.Busia had managed to convince Afrifa and Kotoka to handover power to him.

The Ghanaian Times then described Busia as too desperate for power in the following words "We're shocked that while we're trying to show the world that there is political stability in the country and that investors need not fear for their investment, people who should know better go about shooting their mouths and asking for a change of government within a few months. That we have said and will say is pure madness ".

In July, 1967,the NLC established the National Advisory Committee in place of the political committee that advised the NLC on issues affecting the country. It consisted 31 members with Busia as chairman. There was certainly no doubt that the ground was being prepared for him to assume the mantle of leadership.People like Nene Azu Mate Kole,Prof Ofosu Appiah,S.G Antor,M.K Apaloo and S.D. Dombo served on the committee.These were all staunch supporters of Busia.Such political moves began to raise suspicion in the country. Busia added and confirmed the suspicion when he declared there were some ideas and ideals which they in the former opposition shared with those who organized the 1966 coup The NLC decided that in order to prepare the populace for the return to civilian rule or de- Nkrumahnize Ghana, the chairman of the NLC, Lt Gen Ankrah inaugurated a new agency called "Center for Civic Education on June 7,1967.Busia helped establish the CCE and became its first chairman of the board of Trustees. An Akuffo Addo constitutional commission was set up and entrusted the job of collecting the views of all sections of the country on the type of constitution.

The submitted its lengthy proposals in January, 1968.A 140 member Constituent Assembly was put in place to discuss the constitutional proposals.Before that, the NLC decreed that the constituent assembly would be established partly by election and partly by nomination. Of the 140 members, 49 were elected local councils,91 were named by such groups as houses of chiefs,TUC,farmers, professional associations,civil service etc.Busia was elected by his old constituency, Wenchi- East to the assembly.

The assembly was formerly inaugurated by Lt Gen J.A Ankrah on January 6,1969 to consider the recommendations of the constitutional commission from January to July the same year .This body put in place was overwhelmingly pro-Busia.By this time, the CPP's power base has been diffused. Upon the advice of the commission, the NLC decreed the exclusion of all major figures in the former CPP government from politics. In January, 1968,the NLC government took an undemocratic step by excluding, for ten years,all those who had held public office or party posts in the CPP administration since independence by enacting NLC Decree 223.Even though the ban on political activities was lifted on May 1,1969,Busia was known to be engaged in clandestine political activities since 1966.

It is therefore crystal clear that the NLC prepared the way for the assumption of political leadership for the Danqua/Busia group, a group that would do anything, including murder to get what they want even if the people reject them.The undemocratic strategies adopted by the NLC, with Busia remotely controlling the NLC to disenfranchise the CPP elements is unprecedented and unsurpassed in our political history.

The NPP should therefore forever be ashamed of such a tradition,a tradition that would bully its way to any height. If they are not in charge, who ever occupies that position is not fit.I hold the believe that if you're designed by Providence to be king, you don't struggle to get there like Busia did and Akuffo Addo is also currently doing. It comes naturally because it is written and what is written is written. I will submit in my next article how Busia institutionalized corruption and it became pervasive in their two year rule, a style Kuffour used to milk this country. Stay tuned for more on "WHEN THEY WERE IN POWER ".

Source: CLARK, EDWARD.

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