You are here: HomeOpinionsArticles2014 03 06Article 302515

Opinions of Thursday, 6 March 2014

Columnist: Frimpong, Yaw

Happy 57th independence day to "religious" ghanaians

IN THE BEGINNING


"At long last, the battle has ended! And thus Ghana, your beloved country is free forever."
And yet again I want to take the opportunity to thank the chiefs and people of this country, the youth, the farmers, the women who have so nobly fought and won this battle.

People who know me personally slam me for having too wild an imagination but I can say without a shame or doubt that on 6th March, 1957 whilst Dr. Kwame Nkrumah was saying the words above, he was imaging Ghana as a country which will be having skyscrapers which will literally touch the eye of God, that Ghana would be having an economy so good that the Western world will literally beg us to "spoil our economy small". There would be job so abundant that managers will have to go round people's house begging them to stop their work in order for them to come work for his company. As Nkrumah said these words, he was smiling, the religious Ghanaian was also smiling yet wider. Both Nkrumah and the religious Ghanaian were imaging things but the imaginations of the religious Ghanaian were inversely proportion to that of Nkrumah; whilst Nkrumah was imaging all what I have described above, the religious Ghanaian was imaging how he would have successful packed about $1million in a Swizz Bank, he was imaging about how he could single handedly "chop" Ghana's money and leave the man on the street poor.

THE RELIGIOUS GHANAIAN
For the sake of this article, I will give an operational definition of who a religious Ghanaian is. A religious Ghanaian is one who on Friday or on Sunday wears the best of clothing to the mosque or the church and sing Halleluyah to the Highest yet comes back and engages in the nastiest of activities which includes (and not mutually exclusive): throwing rubbish around, engage in bribery and corruption, gossiping about her sister, stealing from his brother, engaging in nepotism among others.


3 MORE YEARS TO PENSION
Now having digressed let me continue with this article. Isn't it a shame that after fifty seven years of independence, we cannot construct a single road without going to borrow money from somewhere? Yes 57! Ghana is not five neither is she seven, she is fifty seven! If Ghana was a human being, she will be having three more years to pension. After all these years, nothing seems to work in this country. Nothing oo my brother. you can't take more than ten steps without regretting for being a Ghanaian.

THE RELIGIOUS DRIVER
Things are that worse. The religious driver will wake up four o'clock in the morning and commence his activities. He goes to the bus terminal and tells his conductor, let's go to TECH. His "mate" will shout "TECH TECH TECH" and people will rush to board the car. The driver will successfully drive to TECH and tell all the people in the bus to get down. Immediately they get down, his mate again will shout "OFORIKROM OFORIKFROM" and these same passengers will board the car and pay extra transportation fare to Oforikrom. At Oforikrom, all the passengers get down and the "mate"shouts again "LABOUR LABOUR LABOUR", now theses passengers angry will have no option than to board these same car again. At Labour, all the passengers will get down again and then the mate will shout "ADUM ADUM ADUM". At the end of the day, the transportation fare which should have cost GHC0.90 due to this "WAWA" activity will now cost GHC2.30.

THE PASSENGERS
Don't feel pity for these passengers yet! Not at all! These passengers will go to work and the way they will offer their services to you, it is as if he is doing you a favour. First of all, the passenger will get to work as late as 9 (sometimes far later) and begin to show his "Krachi" powers. He will make you literally beg him before he serves you. You may (it is not option but it is highly recommended) have to pass a brown envelope under his counter before he will do his job and do it properly. Go to places like ECG offices, some banks, ministers etc and you will feel sorry for not knowing anyone around.


THE POWER OF MARKET WOMEN
The market woman will go and sit innocently on the pavement and sell her wares. After she has finished, she will leave the rubbish unattended to and expects the government to clean it. Madam, don't you know that all these moneys can be used to build schools, hospitals and other amenities to better the lives of people? Did I mention hospital? Yes I did. Go to the hospital and your ailment will just become worse! The nurse will look at you as if you are a mental case and shout the hell out of you. The doctor is so much in a worry that immediately you enter his office, the next thing he thinks of is you leaving his office, whether the medicine he prescribed to you will work or not, its not his business.

THE LAUGHING POLITICIANS
As for the politician, the least said about him the better. He knows all the solution to Ghana's problem during the election year but surprisingly he forgets all of it when he gets the power. When he is given power, he sends all his children to schools abroad, he takes a plane to the States when he is ill and through corruption spends the poor people's money.

THE SCHOOL MATRON
After the headmaster and his assistant have spent part of the money that is meant for the feeding of the student, the matron will in turn steals some of the food she will use to prepare food for the student. The kind of food she will prepare for the student, for your eyes only. The student will out of hunger eat the food like that, abi, the option they have now is; eat or starve. Asem oo.

THE STUDENT
The student who is supposed to be the future leader of this country will call his parent and tell them "Dad/Mummy, we have to buy so so and so pamphlet". The parent will send him the money and guess what, the student will use the money to do nkwaseasem. At the end of the day, he is broke. The kind of future leaders, we are training

SUNDAY COMETH
On Sunday, all the people above will dress up and go to church. As for me, I am a gossip, I listen to some of the prayers. You will hear some SCREAM "Jesus, my work oo", "Jesus, my aschool ooo", "Jesus, my visa ooo". For God's sake, how do you expect God to help you when you don't help your fellow man. I have seen drivers cheat passengers, surprisingly, almost all of them are broke. The worker and the police both take bride all day yet yamutu. Let me not spoil this day for you, HAPPY 57TH BIRTHDAY GHANA!