Response: Golden Stool Takes Over Kumasi Lands

I read with utter dismay and disappointment the news that a prime land in the Kumasi area that has long been in the control and ownership of the Ghana central government will be "divested to the Golden Stool as the lawful owner."

Stated otherwise, the prime real estate will now be owned by the Ashanti chief. This act by the courts, purportedly backed by the current government, is meant to redress a colonial ordinance that vested ultimate land ownership to the British Crown. And in order to correct that legal discrepancy (the British colonials left Ghana in 1957), the current government of Ghana (made up of full-blooded Ghanaians) has decided to hand over government-owned land to a single chief.

The Asantehene has also emphatically averred that the Adum lands belong to him personally. Remember, Ghanaians, this implies that all lands within reach of every Ghanaian chief's landed jurisdiction are owned by the reigning chief. To add insult to injury, the Ghana government has been told in no uncertain terms by the Ashanti chief that the government has since 1943 served only as a trustee for the government's own land and that it has to pay restitution or reparations, whatever you may call it, not to the citizens of that area, but directly to the Ashanti chief.

Accompanying that implied order to pay restitution, the amount of which has been predetermined by the chief, is a clear threat by the chief to the government (indirectly to the people of Ghana): "The Asantehene had as well warned the government (Lands Commission) to prepare to account for the accumulated royalties for the land they managed all these years, adding teasingly 'I will not take peanuts'." What the chief means is that he is not going to accept any offer of restitution from the government that may not sit well with him (anyway, he meant groundnuts), except what he has predetermined to be the appropriate amount. What a shame! What an abomination!

My fellow Ghanaians, be aware that whilst monarchy is a slow but a steadily dying institution around the world, in Ghana, however, it is being strengthened further by this nefarious precedent-setting court action. Every city, town, and village in the country has a chief. How many tiers of controlling leadership can the country handle? Chiefs in Ghana currently own most, if not all, hands in the country, anyway. Now, following this court action, other chiefs will be emboldened not only to threaten but also to file legal claims for ownership of government-controlled lands that are contiguous to their current sphere of territorial control.

These are the same chiefs who often sell individual plots of land multiple times over to different people. These are the same chiefs who are generally perceived by the ordinary Ghanaian as inept, myopic, corruptible and out of touch with twenty-first century progress.

My fellow Ghanaians, you need to wake up to what is really happening in our beloved country. The critical question that everyone should ask is -What remains of the central government's power when it comes to eminent domain? Eminent domain is the power of the state over all property within the state. It addresses the power of the state to appropriate land and property for the public good and use. Of course, the private owner of any appropriated land and property is entitled to a reasonable compensation. Such attempts by the state to appropriate any land and property and pay a just compensation can be challenged by the private owner in a court action. When challenged, the onus of proof for the use of the property for the public good heavily weighs on the government.

Does this mean that, by relinquishing control over the Adum lands, the government is left to pay "just compensation" (it depends on who considers any payment "just") directly to the Ashanti chief, but not to the people of Adum, for any future eminent domain undertakings in addition to the rollback of the so-called royalties that goes back to 1943 that is being exacted by the chief and that will accrue directly to the chief and nobody else? If there have been allegations of mismanagement and misappropriation of lands revenue in Kumasi dating back to 1958, why then should we expect a common good to come out of this arbitrary transfer of the Adum lands to a single individual?

Anyway, what do the chiefs in the country do with the enormous incomes from all land sales that are directly paid to them? Do they use the land sale revenues in the interest of the residents or are they the chiefs' personal income? I am not aware of a single accountability request from the central government to the chiefs to declare their earnings. Do chiefs declare their incomes and pay taxes? I believe that the financial worth of each chief should be public information.

The lack of acceptable responses to these concerns and questions is evidenced in the poor and decrepit eyesores we see around the country in the name of town planning. With the current land sale process in the country come the filth, unsanitary conditions, pollution, overcrowding, preventable diseases, and neighborhoods without any aesthetic picturesque look. The chiefs sell lands without regard to zoning for the separation of residential, commercial, and recreational land allotments. Lands are sold indiscriminately and the result is the intermingling of residential, commercial and agrarian activities concentrated in the centers of all of the major cities in the country. Many parts of central Accra, Kumasi, Cape Coast, Takoradi, and other cities are rife with examples of the mixture of storefronts in residential neighborhoods; commercial and mom and pop industrial activities that sometime go on 24/7 in residential areas; goats, chicken, sheep, and sometimes cows that roam and their droppings that are deposited everywhere in the residential areas.

Isn't it about time to start thinking about the discontinuation of the chieftaincy, as it currently is, as an out-of-date institution? Or should they be relegated to only a ceremonial role instead of having them have the social, political, and financial power they currently arrogate to themselves? Should we work to jolt them and revamp them into the 21st century? Or are they so entrenched as a Ghanaian power structure that no push for change or improvement will help?

Ghana definitely needs a revolutionary change in its social structure. Chieftaincy has become a joke so much so that they are readily conferred on any foreign national, mostly Europeans and Americans, that we fall in love with. Let's take a breadth as a country and be bold and ponder over the real need to continue this old institution. We should be bold and ask: "Do they add value to our growth and progress or are they a liability and a drain on the system?"