*By Akadu Ntiriwa Mensema, Ph. D.



“A 50 million Euro loan facility has been secured by government for the Ghana Police Service to procure over 500 vehicles to enhance the work of service personnel. This was disclosed by Vice president John Dramani Mahama when he joined officers and men of the service at the annual Ghana Police Service West Africa Security Activities, WASSA, 2011 end of year party at the Police Headquarters in Accra” (Ghanaweb February 26, 2012).



Oh! Radioactive thieves

Pen-armed robbers

Take a loan of 50 million

Ah! Give away 50 million

Hmm! Ah! Free 50 million

To a crony

To a con artist

To Crook Woyome

The celebrated thief

The calibrated thief

Celebrated by his chiefs



Our archives of pain

Our wombs of pain

Like pregnant women

In painful living-death

In our hospitals

Death & deadly

Derelict hospitals

Decrepit hospitals

Decaying hospitals

Dilapidated hospitals

Our birthrights of corruption

Oh! Biographies of corruption

Our genealogies of corruption



Eh! Massa we dey meet paa

Ah! My Child we meet again



Eh! Massa now time hard

Ah! You no dey alone oh



Today tro tro be empty

Ah! People no get money



Oh! The police dey for road

Hmm! Police na so so bribes



Our national lunacy

Our deep lunacy

Herded by thieves

Educated thieves

Pen-armed robbers

Thieves of our hope

Thieves that kill hope



Massa see policeman shoes

Ha ha haa! Erosion get am



Massa that be wicked joke

The Police go improve now



Eh! Woyome dey for road

Police no like Woyome bribe



My child Mills take loan

Eh! Massa another loan



Hmm! Child yes loans

Another loan to buy cars

To clean Accra

To dig pit latrines

To buy chewing sticks

To drain Korle Lagoon

To buy Chinese chop sticks

To bring in foreign artisans

To buy foreign sand



Oh! This loan is a good one

This dey buys cars for police



Massa how much loan

Oh! 50 million Euros



We Ghanaians be funny paa

Foreign diplomats don laugh



Yes! Dey for laugh at us

And we for laugh at us too



Eh! Woyome get free 50 Million

Eh! We take loan of 50 million



Master, I go get down here

My Child! Another day



Oh! Our lost cause

Of celebrating thieves

Of lionizing crooks

Of reserving state burials

For pen-armed robbers

For killers of our dream

Ah! This painful circus

That lacerates our hearts

In the postcolony of fools

In a full circle circling fools

In a fool’s errand for fools



*Akadu Ntiriwa Mensema, Ph. D., is a nationalist Denkyira beauty. She is a trained

oral historian cum sociologist and Professor in the USA. She lives in Pennsylvania

with her great mentor and teaches Africa-area studies at a college in Maryland. In

her pastime, she writes what critics have called “populist hyperbolic, satirical”

poetry. She can be reached at akadumensema@yahoo.com