The Ghana Political Tradition and the Men who made it: The Kwame Nkrumah Legacy

By: Abena Kwatemaa Offeh-Gyimah

"We face neither East nor West; we face forward" Kwame Nkrumah In my previous article, I made it clear that I intend to examine the Ghana political tradition. What I mean by the Ghana political tradition is the workings, ideas and policies that have shaped Ghana over the past several years. This series of articles I plan to write is not only presenting a historical account of the men I believe contributed to the political tradition of Ghana, but take a constructive analysis in examining how some of their decisions affected Ghana.

It is only proper to examine Dr. Kwame Nkrumah first, due to the fact that, he was the first president of Ghana in the early years of Ghana as a nation, Also, it was his brilliance and ambition that led Ghana to achieve independence. In addition, his government was the first post colonial government run solely by an African/local party, the Convention People’s Party, (CPP). It is important to note that under Dr. Nkrumah’s government, Ghana, as the first sub-African independent nation from colonial power faced dramatic infrastructure, social and economic developments. Although, it is often argued that Nkrumah established a progressive political order in Ghana, it is the failure of this political order that will be examined in this article.

Kwame Nkrumah was born in September of 1909 at Nkroful in the Western region of Ghana. Nkrumah was formerly known as Francis Nwia-Kofi Ngonlomam, but changed his name to Kwame Nkrumah. This was due to an incident in his early years of schooling, when the teacher who enrolled him in school mistakenly wrote “Nkrumah” for “Ngonlomam”. Later in his educational life, he left to the United States to pursue his studies in Lincoln University in Pennsylvania. He then proceeded to England to further his studies in law, where he met George Padmore and they teamed up to organize Pan-African Congress, where he intensified his ideas for de-colonization of Africa.

Moreover, Kwame Nkrumah was the visionary of Pan-Africanism, a dream of uniting Africa. The idea of Pan-Africanism is a movement that seeks to unify native Africans, and African states. This idea developed during slavery and was thus taken by Nkrumah, as he had a vision for Africa and the Black race. He wanted to bridge the gaps between Africans; this could be seen in his involvement in Congo, before and after the country attained independence. His Pan-African vision was total liberation and unification for Africa. The Pan-Africanist thought, helped him develop over the years, with a mission to end degradation, centuries of slavery, colonialism and other forms of domination. Eventually, he went back to Africa, specifically, Gold Coast where he became the secretary for the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) but was later dismissed for his radical stance on independence.

It is imperative to note that Nkrumah’s first start as a professional politician was given to him by Dr. Danquah upon returning to Ghana from London. Danquah was the chairman of the UGCC, and he needed someone like Nkrumah for the party, someone with energy, enthusiasm and ambition. This position was suggested to Nkrumah by Ako Adjei, who was also a young graduate. The purpose of Danquah’s Convention was to gain self-government for Gold Coast in the shortest time possible. However, Danquah resented the way in which Nkrumah used and directed the Convention, almost as if it belonged to him. Danquah was fearful of confrontation with the government at that time; however, there were disturbances and confrontation, which led Danquah and his committee to exile in the north. Danquah and Nkrumah had different perceptions of how the road to self-government should be won, and thus Nkrumah was dismissed from his post.

Moreover, Nkrumah’s rise to power was rapid. His party, the Convention People’s Party (CPP) was filled with many energetic young men from Danquah’s Convention. Right before independence, March 1957, the CPP has filled 71 seats out of 104 in the national Assembly. He became the leader of the first black African colony on the road to independence. In his later years, there was incoherence in Nkrumah’s political ideas. He was moving away from African socialism towards a scientific socialism based on the Soviet Union and some European countries. He thought that because scientific socialism, at that time had made Russia and China respective powers, it could also be applied to Africa. His party was committed to ideals of modernity, science and progress, one which the people in Ghana were not ready for.

Nkrumah’s political order began to fail because he thought himself as the man of destiny who alone held the key to African’s future. He lacked interest in domestic affairs; in the affairs of the country he had just achieved independence for, Ghana. Although he was the president, he looked beyond Ghana’s frontiers. It is often argued that Nkrumah probably thought that Africa’s unity would follow right after Ghana’s independence; however, after independence it seemed as if he was unsure what to do next, and Ghana suffered an economic strangulation in 1965. The political principles he proclaimed, after independence had little connection with what went on in the daily lives of Ghanaians. Ghana suffered from Nkrumah’s rule in the later stages because he gathered all political power into his hands, forgetting that Danquah had provided him with the first real part in 1947 and also forgetting to focus on domestic affairs. In the long run, Ghanaians did not share Nkrumah’s belief in power of politics.

I am not disregarding the fact that, there was vibrant achievements and development once Nkrumah took office as the leader of Ghana. Ghanaians supported Nkrumah’s building of schools, clinics, village and town centres, roads and thus forth. Between the years 1957 and 1959, Ghana experienced a massive outpouring of productive energy. It was seen as the developed model for upcoming African nations. However, Ghana began to suffer severely from his government as the years progressed. From 1960, cocoa prices suffered, his enormous spending a few years before affected Ghana, there was a massive food and essential commodities shortages in Ghana. His response was a flawed Marxist concept of economics, through harsh taxation. There was financial mismanagement and economic chaos, which arose. The ideas of Nkrumah were complex, though profound and moving. It can be argued that he imposed his ideas on Ghana. As much as independence was important to Ghana, it was also important to note that what came after it was equally important to Ghanaians. He did not necessarily consider the economic state of Ghana after independence, which caused the Ghanaian economy to deteriorate.

Although, some of his infrastructures still remain in Ghana today, Nkrumah did not focus on improving the lifestyles for Ghanaians. He allowed his political ideologies to over take him, making himself the sole president, adopting a one party state and suppressing all oppositional powers. Ghana became the first African state to achieve independence. An independent nation, that was not yet ready for a charismatic leader, who, others claim may have been born ahead of his time. His shortcomings resulted in political destruction for a people who just wanted to be free from colonial powers.

Some academic literature describes Nkrumah’s government as a communist satellite state; others say he was the Pan African Founding father of Ghana, or a case study between modernization and traditional life. Whatever he might be to different people, depending from the lens that one examines him from; he was the first to give the gift of independence to Ghana. However, like J. B. Danquah wrote, “The true role of leadership must be support of individual freedom and personal worth. Human beings, not things make a nation great. Kwame Nkrumah forgot that and condemned his nation to many years of political and economic agony”

References: Jones, Trevor. Ghana’s First Republic 1960-1966. Great Britain: Methuen & Co Ltd, 1976 Nkrumah, Kwame. I Speak of Freedom. Great Britain: William Heinemann Ltd, 1961 Fage, J. D. Ghana: A Historical Interpretation. USA: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1966 Agyeman, Opoku. Nkrumah’s Ghana and East Africa. USA: Associated University presses, 1992