Wednesday, October 20, 2010
A Country Without Heroes Is Not Worth Dying For
By K B Asante
Celebrating Nkrumah’s birthday and recalling his policies and works is an anathema to quite a number of Ghanaians.
This is understandable since some were hurt by his policies and acts while others disagreed with him and either assisted in his overthrow or rejoiced when it happened.
Also, generally as a people we tend to denigrate even our friends who seem to get on – the Ph. D or pull-him-down tendency.
But putting unfortunate personal prejudices and ignorance aside and taking the emancipation of the African seriously, Kwame Nkrumah deserves the pedestal on which he has been placed.
This does not mean that the country has never produced great men and women or that other historical personalities will not emerge. There were heroes before Nkrumah and more will and must emerge if we are to meet future challenges.
We should honour our heroes and as we do this, the unique contribution of Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah will be more appreciated.
This will not happen so long as we see Nkrumah and indeed Africa through foreign eyes and prejudices. Nkrumah was accused of being dictatorial and of cultivating a personality cult. Foreign commentators seized on this to damage him.
They cited events to justify their views. I will recall two false examples. The first is that Nkrumah forced parliamentary candidates on constituencies.
I was surprised when a Ghanaian professor dished out this falsehood as an illustration of party autocracy.
The professor gave a brilliant lecture on democracy or lack of it in our political parties. But he wrongly began by citing the parliamentary candidate story as an example of Nkrumah’s dictatorship over the CPP.
It was true that candidates who lived, say, in Accra, were made to stand for constituencies in the north and so on. But was that an imposition by Nkrumah?
The answer was no even though Nkrumah as any leader should do, made his views known and did influence decisions.
CPP adherents may not like to know this but the debating skills of the opposition in parliament were better on the whole than those of the CPP.
Kwame Nkrumah as a realist knew that, that would undermine the credibility policies and proposals of the party.
But not much could be done when the talents of CPP members in Accra for example, could not be used. Those talented people could not represent the party in parliament because they came from the wrong region.
Nkrumah and some party faithfuls wanted the system changed so that the CPP could field members to match the opposition in parliament.
Kwame Nkrumah also, particularly, wanted women in parliament and again, the eligible women from the party’s point of view did not reside in the appropriate constituencies.
The discussions which followed it turned out some constituencies would even prefer influential distinguished party men to represent them in parliament so that their constituency or region might be rapidly developed.
This expectation was not strange. In Accra, quite a few good roads were constructed which appeared to lead to nowhere. In fact they led somewhere—to a Minister’s residence.
Therefore, such a powerful person representing the constituency would get schools and clinics built.
And so the idea which came from Nkrumah and a few were supported by some party members for a variety of reasons.
But some party members opposed the idea which was eventually adopted. Of course Nkrumah’s role was crucial but he did not dictate to the party.
And what is a leader for when he waffles through various ideas and policies and does not guide and lead? When the professor was asked to check his facts he was not pleased because what he said was recorded in a book written by a distinguished British academic!
The British academic could not be wrong. Even if he got his “facts” from his Ghanaian friends who were against Nkrumah, we appear to have been so brainwashed that we have put it in our constitution that a member of parliament should either belong or hail from his constituency.
For the benefit of those academics and intellectuals who are only convinced when their mentors write or say so, I will quote from a speech made long ago to the electors of Bristol in England on November 3, 1774 by the British writer and politician, Edmund Burke.
He said “Parliament is not a congress of ambassadors from different and hostile interests which interests each must maintain but parliament is a deliberative assembly of one nation, with one interest, that of the whole, is where not local purposes, not local prejudices ought to guide, but the general good, resulting from the general reason of the whole.
You choose a member indeed; but when you have chosen him, he is not a member of Bristol, but he is a member of parliament.”
And so what Nkrumah and the CPP tried to inculcate in the Ghanaian mind about parliamentary representation was nothing new or strange.
The second example was the establishment of the Young Pioneers organisation which was said to be designed to spread a personality cult.
Over-zealous CPP leaders tried to win the young from other organisations, especially the Boy Scout and Girl Guide movement. They asked the young to shut their eyes and sing Nkrumah’s praises.
After that sweets fell down. To many who were against Nkrumah, it was another example of his megalomania and promotion of the personality cult. They commented on the unattractive side of the movement and refused to understand its main purpose.
To them, the purpose was revealed by the over-enthusiasm of some instructors who asked young pioneers to shut their eyes and sing praises to Nkrumah and then open them to find that lozenges and other sweets had fallen down.
When they prayed no sweets fell down. The lesson was clear.
Many CPP supporters laughed that off instead of condemning it. President Nkrumah got to know about the unsavoury doings of some young pioneer instructors but did not put a stop to it.
Here, he was wrong and, thereby contributed to the failure to understand why a national patriotic youth organisation was necessary.
At Independence and after, the main surviving youth organisation was the Boy Scout Movement and its counterpart, the Girl Guides. Many leading educationists like B.A. Quarcoo vigorously supported the Boy Scout Movement which promoted good behaviour based on accepted social and moral norms.
Why then should Nkrumah try to replace such a useful movement? The answer goes to the heart of African self-respect and black consciousness.
Now the Scout Movement was founded by Baden Powell, a British soldier who was on the staff in Ashanti and won fame as the defender of the Mofeking, during the war between the British and the Boers in South Africa.
His fame which brought him the post of General and peerage was won through the deceit and treachery of the African.
Africans were misled to believe that the war was against the Boers and victory would safeguard their lands.
They joined in the war and were made to suffer starvation and slaughter. Their role was not acknowledged and Baden Powell was not truthful about crucial African participation.
Recent publications in South Africa reveal Baden Powell’s anti-African posture. Nkrumah did not consider it politic to allow the youth of Ghana to be led by a movement whose foundation subordinated African interests to those of the colonialists.
He, therefore, sought to create an indigenous movement which would espouse African values. His ideas were not well-executed and he had to take some blame for it.
But even desiccated scholars should give him credit for his laudable objectives and efforts.
His understanding of the need to uproot African self-subordination and establish black self-respect and confidence made him great.
We should honour our great men and women and allow them to inspire us. Marking Nkrumah’s birthday does not close the door to honouring other heroes.
Celebrating Martin Luther King Day does not belittle the contribution of recent great Americans like Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Our problem in Ghana and Africa generally is that the true history has never been fully disclosed.
Our scholars have a difficult but urgent task to unearth the truth about African endeavours.
They should be assisted with the necessary resources to unearth the truth from the archives and other sources.
They should be given the means so that they are not misguided by foreign accounts.
Source: Daily Graphic