Put Ideas and their equity in the leadership debate

E. Ablorh-Odjidja, Ghanadot

December 23, 2013

Sometimes, in our attempts to wrestle with aspects of Nkrumah’s legacy, political egos get in the way; no matter how worthy the subject.

One proposal for correction out there suggests common criteria for leadership assessments. But this proposal has one weakness: too many points that could obfuscate the outcome.

Two criteria points should be enough - “ideas” and their “equity.”

By equity, we must expect value from the ideas – value as assessed in a property after all debts are paid.

Thus, a competent actuary could tell that revenue from (and the equity stash in) the Akosombo Dam to date would settle any debt incurred in the construction and still leave us with some surplus; even after payment of any amount “generously” bequeathed to us by the British.

Otherwise, what would you have done with the loot from the British after their 100 years rule?

The best way to determine value in an investment is to think of the opportunity cost spread over time: Instead of a dam, would you have bought oil for your industrialization efforts?

You may also try the same approach to arrive at the benefits and costs of a coup.

On a miniscule scale, the inheritance of a dam can be likened to that of a commercial property in a high rent area. Since 1966 that property keeps giving just as the equity in its real estate keeps growing.

No one in his right mind should scorn such an inheritance. Try the same method on an inheritance from a coup.

How “ideas” and their “equity” work can steer us away from the ideological prejudices of the moment and lead us to pragmatic assessment of the true worth of our past leaders.

Did Nkrumah waste our heritage, funds and assets? You still have to provide the alternative usage as to what could have been done with those assets.

There are those who question Nkrumah’s investments in external affairs. They dismiss the necessity of uniting Africa. But the results on Nkrumah’s efforts are already in. The notion of “African unity” has become the sine qua non for liberating Africa. His ideas about free Africa formed a cornerstone of liberation movements in settler countries in Africa.

In the end, it also bought a lot of good will for Ghana.

However, even if we were to accept the accusation that Nkrumah was a dictator, who used our resources against our will, we should be honest to accept the belief that his dictatorship was quashed on February 24, 1966.

So, what’s our problem now and have we faired better since?

First, to think that 24 million Ghanaians today are still under the spell of a badly conceived blueprint from Nkrumah can only diminish our mental acuity as a people.

Second, can’t we the people ever alter or change this blueprint? We have had a long time at it since the February 24 coup.

We threw out Nkrumah with the wash, good ideas and all. Or as they say, to swat a fly on a wall we demolished the building. Under the motive of “What went wrong in Ghana” we destroyed everything.

Was there a mistake in the manner we handled the situation after Nkrumah? I know, we prefer silence to declaring that something went awfully wrong in the transition from Nkrumah to Kotoka.

The idea of “self-government now” was a project, promptly backed by investments in assets for the purpose of industrialization and development.

The results were items such as dam, highways, railways, universities, schools, hospitals, a brand-new seaport and a planned township.

Perhaps, other leaders could have done better than Nkrumah with the same resources. But as plausible as this assumption may be, the stark reality is that none of the leaders of his time left a formed plan as to what the better alternative to Nkrumah’s could have been.

Therefore, we have nothing to base a comparison. To push this assumption further not only makes it wishful, but silly.

But who are we to judge fate even if we were to take out from consideration the political competencies of Nkrumah’s opponents?

Our job now is to correct the mistakes of the past. To do this, we must be honest about what happened.

Thirty years after Nkrumah, President Kufuor would recognize the value of some of his predecessor’s ideas and implement them.

But what happened after Kufuor’s transition to Mills?  Notice how fast Kufuor’s policies were reversed soon after he left office.

Do we believe in the British nostalgia, hence the constant reference to the so-called vast amount inherited from them at independence, or this tendency is just a ploy to get back at Nkrumah?

In truth, the British were not in Ghana for charity. They got more from us than they left us.

Fortunately, we ended the British rule after hundred years.  We are the beneficiaries of the vast physical and social infrastructures Nkrumah built - on his terms and ideas, not to mention the goodwill he left us with the rest of Africa.

The idea of independence is to develop fast and sufficient enough to stand on our own feet. In this quest, Nkrumah had ideas that worked. How these investments transited from one leader to the next was another matter.

Shall we say a monumental failure that honest people should accept?

Remember, after February 24, 1966 every investment by Nkrumah was a waste. The dam, Job 600 (now parliament and state house), Team Motorway were all white elephants.

And Tema was a glorified slum, we said!

Seriously, there has to be an ulterior motive in the failure to examine Nkrumah’s ideas and the equity derived from them.

As to the use of our farm labors, Tetteh Quashie would be pleased and honored to know that Nkrumah was able to build schools and provide scholarships on the back of the valued proceeds from the former’s singular effort.

Our honorable “good ancestors,” the British governors, would worry in their graves that for close to hundred years and with all the resources available to them before they left, they did not do enough to match Nkrumah’s later efforts at developing Ghana in six years.

Generations of Ghana’s leaders would be envious because they would never have the opportunity to build dams, harbors, railway lines and other social amenities – all in a matter of six years – like Nkrumah did!

But there is more.

There were some bad policies under Nkrumah. Yes, he had a Prevention Detention bill. But so did the British. Ask about the travails of our Big Six.

However, did the foreign influences that destroyed our future prospects in February 24, 1966 do so because they had our best interest at heart? 

If true, then don't dare to question the worth of slavery or colonialism. Do continue to believe that these were benevolent institutions.

Colonizing us didn’t make us any better as a people.  It turned us into glorified slaves.  We became free at independence.

The problem is after February 24, 1966 we became neo-colonized. Even the Chinese are now part of the act. And, with more resources now than we had then, our economy is still very weak.

Read this report from Bloomberg of December 22, 2013:

 “The currency of the world’s second-biggest cocoa producer plummeted 15 percent this year against the dollar…the worst among 22 African currencies tracked by Bloomberg after the South African rand, the Malawian kwacha and Sudan’s pound.”

But no worry, blame Nkrumah anyway! 

Continue to convince the least among us that it is better to sleep in mud huts while others cart our millions away to foreign banks and countries.

E. Ablorh-Odjidja, publisher, www.ghanadot.com, Washington, DC, December 23, 2013

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