Nkrumah Birthday proposed to be observed as national holiday

A Presidential Staffer, Professor Kofi Awoonor, yesterday suggested that September 21,birthday of first President Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah should declared a national holiday.

He said the next administration of the progressive Alliance would move a motion for the adoption and observance of the day just as United States of America observes that of George Washington. Prof. Awoonor said this at the 91st birthday anniversary and wreath laying ceremony of Dr. Nkrumah at the Old Polo Grounds (now Kwame Nkrumah mausoleum) where he proclaimed Ghana's independence in March 1957. The wreath laying formed part of a programme of activities lined up by the Nkrumaist Brigade, Old students of the Winneba Ideological Institute, Comrades of Nkrumah in the struggle for independence and the Progressive Alliance to mark the day.

He said Nkrumah belonged to the nation and his heritage is beyond party politics, ethnicity and ideology. "He is the tallest tree in the forest and so long as the nation lives Nkrumah's name will never be erased," he exhorted.

Prof. Awoonor said Nkrumah taught the nation selflessness, humility, nationalism, patriotism and unity, which the present generation must emulate. He called for the orientation of the new generation of politicians and activists to read and learn about "the man of Africa and the black race" who embarked on the struggle for the emancipation and liberation of the continent from colonialism.

He said Nkrumah did not struggle for Ghana alone but for Africa and all oppressed people of the Diaspora. "We must therefore gird our loins and put on the armour of resistance to fight on, for the struggle has to continue so long as conditions for it (struggle) still exist," he added.

Prof. Awoonor said the Progressive Alliance would not allow those who deserted Nkrumah and denied him any right to nationhood as well as those who destroyed his memory and attempted to erase it from history any chance to rule the nation. Alhaji Huudu Yahaya, General Secretary of the NDC noted that "the torch of nationhood which Nkrumah lit on the eve of Independence and transferred to President Rawlings which is about to be re-transferred to Professor Atta Mills cannot be put off". He said, the least that the nation could do to the memory of the founder of Ghana is to keep the struggle of empowering the ordinary man aflame.