A former Director-General of the Ghana Health Service, Professor Agyeman Badu Akosa says the deliberate attempt by foreign leaders to extol the virtues of the late Nelson Mandela is because his posturing after his release from jail ‘appeased’ the west unlike Dr. Kwame Nkrumah.

“Kwame Nkrumah is Africa’s greatest and the African of the millennium that is Kwame Nkrumah, Nelson Mandela epitomizes certain things, which you fight for your people not counting the cost which is what Nkrumah did,” Prof. Akosa said.

Several world leaders including USA President, Barack Obama who graced the funeral service of the late South African president described Nelson Mandela as the “Greatest African Liberator of the 20th century”.

But, Professor Badu Akosa in an interview with Radio XYZ’s Strict Proof Wednesday said the numerous praises being showered on the late South African president by the West is because his activities inured to the economic benefit of the west.

According to Prof. Badu Akosa, the attempt by the western powers to extol the virtues of Mandela above Dr. Kwame Nkrumah is deliberate and misplaced.

He added that although Mr. Mandela must be credited for his fight for the emancipation of Black South Africans and his spirit of forgiveness after 27 years in jail, he failed to extract more from the White South African community to the benefit of the Black South African community.

“His [Nelson Mandela] was probably elevated by the fact he had the spirit of forgiveness for the atrocities that had been meted out to the black people”.

“One of the things that really get to me in South Africa is the fact that Madiba was the only person who could have told the white South African community that there is so much in this country that nobody should be allowed to live below a certain standard. For me that was one thing that he could have done that I don’t think he did.

“As far as Africa is concerned – yes you can talk about the character of Nelson Mandela, but his philosophy, his ideology, his Africaness, he comes nowhere near Osagyefo”.

“…If I take the totality of what Mandela could have done, I say there was some element of ‘appeasement’”.