Trends in Arab Uprising of 2011 and Ghana Uprising of 1966 Looking at what has happened to Egypt and Tunisia, can we still blame the Danquah/Busua tradition for the overthrow of Kwame Nkrumah in 1966? We should all be ashamed of ourselves for blaming and pointing fingers at the Danquah/Busua tradition. We were all happy when we saw the leaders of Tunisia and Egypt being overthrown by their so called “own people” and we are still waiting for Muammar Gaddafi be killed or overthrown. But have we ever thought about the fact that the activities before and after these revolutions are the same that happened in Ghana. The people behind the Arab Uprising are the same people that were behind the overthrow of Kwame Nkrumah and Ghanaians enjoyed it just as we are also sharing the excitement with the people of Tunisia and Egypt. Some will say ours was a military coup, but I will say examine them very well, they are only 45 years apart.

Military Coup is just a description in English of what we the Ghanaians saw. But the trends are the same. They usually do it to countries with leaders that they cannot manipulate. These countries are usually poor and are supposed to be following orders but they do not. They start by stirring up division among people and throwing in the usual accusations which are dictatorship, mismanagement, anti-capitalism and unbearable hardship. Some of these accusations are totally false but they just throw them in to make the usual tea bitterer. Then suddenly the people realize that that they been treated unfairly and they become very bitter. There is usually a demonstration to inform the world that these people are been treated poorly and whatever the outcome might be is justifiable. And behind the scenes they equip and work with the bitter people on possible ways of overthrowing the government. This is where the difference comes in, some leaders just give up and others keep fighting until they are killed or sent into exile. Nkrumah who was not so eager for power and money (even though they made him look exactly that) decided to let GOD have his own way and he saved many lives by not resisting. He could have joined forces with Russia or China to fight for power but he did not. After overthrowing the government there is this suddenly found freedom and excitement like never before by the people. In Ghana there were jubilations on the streets (as in Egypt and Tunisia) of people expressing how free they were after Nkrumah left.

Nkrumah wanted to bring Africans together so as to be able to stand up to these same people for unfair treatment. But these same people turned around and used the same unfair treatment to overthrow him using his own people. So who was being fair? At that time Ghanaians truly saw Nkrumah as an evil man and the west as angel with good intentions for Ghana. It was after 50 something years (some even need more years) that we started to understand Nkrumah’s plan. Some say most Ghanaians were not well educated at that time, some say he was actually a bad leader (a dictator so to say) and mismanaged the economy. I say we should really examine the MAN behind the mirror engineering this destruction and rebuilding process (usually through loans and dependency). What are the intentions of this MAN? If we can all agree on this answer we can do well. We can come up with the best leader in the world, without blemishes (if that’s even possible) and still not succeed if we have to go through this MAN who has his own intention. We should focus on finding ways of standing up to that MAN for fair treatment or else we will be going in circles (destroying and rebuilding) and not forward. Even if we have a good leader he can only help the country to develop if he aligns with this MAN. Those have tried to resist this alignment ended with total destruction after which comes with usual issuing of loans for rebuilding.

The current Arab Uprising makes us witnesses to what actually went on in Ghana in 1966. Books have been written mostly about what we saw, a military coup. In 1966 people joined forces to overthrow what they thought was bad for something even worst. They did not realize what they were doing just as we all joined in jubilating when Mubarak and Ben Ali left. Now this MAN’s work is even easy because we have actually been educated against the very plans that Nkrumah had for Ghana. So if one talks about those plans he is considered to be uneducated, uncivilized and foolish. When Muammar Gaddafi started calling on all African countries to unite over 10 years, what did the so called educated ones say? They joined the west in calling him a mad man and uncivilized (meanwhile he was having far less or no debt with IMF/World Bank than the so called elites). Now with Muammar Gaddafi being forced out another opportunity is going to slide us by leaving us disintegrated where each country has to go through this MAN. I get so many insults whenever I start a conversation on capitalism, IMF/World Bank, democracy, west dependence and machinery. Some do it just because they feel like they are now westernized so they need to flex their English language muscles and others because political affiliation. But history tells us that it is when things get really bad, when we are in the irreversible stage that all these begin to make sense. I want us think about the other plans that we have been educated to consider as bad and see how we can modify them to fit our African lifestyle. By so doing will truly understand Nkrumah’s plan for Ghana and Africa.

Kojo