Attoh Quarshie's outburst

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Attoh Quashie’s outburst

E. Ablorh-Odjidja
October 17, 2019

Never met this gentleman called Attoh Quashie. But I heard a lot about him in my youth, as one of our old stalwart politicians. I am questioning that belief now.

And indeed, stalwart that some repute him to be, he has now in his old age, with his latest interview, present narrative and views he holds on Kwame Nkrumah, given on Samuel Atto-Mensah’s show, “Foot Print,” of October 12, 2019.managed to diminish the little political esteem that some may have had for him.

I may be wrong. But it happened.

And with this same interview, Attoh Quarshie may have cast a dire impression of the mindset of the opposition Nkrumah faced during this era.

Attoh Quarshie made bare some of the political bitterness which existed back then, and which bitterness to this day has helped foul enormously our political system and processes.

This situation calls for some atonement, but Attoh Quashie is giving no space for such. He is still very bitter about Nkrumah.

Back to the interview and I'm looking at this old gentleman, who is in his 90s and I can’t help thinking that the man is caught in a time warp.

There on display is a mixture of confidence, hubris, and the wrong views about situations and events that led to our independence.

His account of the Preventive Detention Act (PDA) is a bit muddled, probably deliberately so. Says he was the reason for the Act and attributes the whole affair to the political callousness of Nkrumah.

The PDA was a preventive measure introduced in 1958, as a result of a series of political violence by the opposition parties of the Gold Coast since 1952, with Attoh Quarshie actions as prime example.

However, the PDA act gained teeth after the R. R. Amponsah and Captain Awhaitey attempted coup and the subsequent trial, about a year after independence in 1957.

Attoh Quarshie, the leader and founder of the “Tokyo Joes” group, and many others, in their separate acts and reputations for violent political activism, were caught in the dragnet after the 1958 coup attempt.

The unfair part of the PDA may have affected some others, but not Attoh Quarshie.

Under Nkrumah, Kofi Crabbe, Ako Adjei, Boi-Doku, and Tawia Adamafio, members of the same CPP family, were detained, which act came after the 1962 Kulungugu bombing. These men arguably were victims, probably because of internal CPP rivalries.

The Kulungugu bombing was just one spot in a stretch of violent political history in the country, in which many lives and limbs of innocent bystanders were not spared. But note, Attoh Quarshie's narrative had no memory of these events, their victims, and true causes, except his own.

Even so, before Nkrumah, the force of the PDA had been alive under the British.

Members of the “Big Six” were sent to jail for preventive reasons. Ironically, Attoh Quarshie knew all of the men the British incarcerated. Plus his own history of violence that brought the Nkrumah’s version of the PDA on him, but he fudges the narrative.

Attoh Quarshie strongly asserts that "mean" Nkrumah was not even a Ghanaian, but a Liberian instead.

But does it matter now that Nkrumah was not a Ghanaian, even if that assertion is a fact or believable?

And would this assertion change the history of how our independence was acquired in 1957 or return us to British sovereignty because the man who led the fight for independence was not a Ghanaian but a Liberian?

Obviously not. He wouldn’t have the independence vanish, even if he could.

But some 60 years after independence, Attoh Quarshie still harbors the same political resentment and outrage toward Nkrumah.

From all historical indications, Nkrumah was Nzima, an ethnic group located at the South-Western tip of Ghana, thus a Ghanaian.

And not to go far from Attoh’s story of Nkrumah's birth, has he noticed the historic picture of Nkrumah and his mother Nyaniba lately, of the two seated side by side?

Nkrumah and Mother

Nkrumah and Mother

Any face reader ought to be able to notice some acute resemblance between the two if he were sincere enough.

This picture, taken in 1947 after Nkrumah’s return to the Gold Coast, is closer to the truth than anything Attoh Quarshie may have in mind about Nkrumah's maternity and nationality.

Meaning, Attoh has no evidence of the claim he makes on Nkrumah’s origin and Nyaniba's motherhood.

The evidence of maternity, which is crucial for an Akan’s identity, is in the blood of the offspring and not available in a picture. However, Attoh Quarshie is not a family member, and neither is he Nzima. His non-relationship to Nkrumah's family is the only fact that relate to his claim.

But soon after this atrocious claim, comes another false assertion about Nkrumah’s qualifications: A description that leaves Nkrumah as a wastrel before the honorable man came to the Gold Coast in 1947.

For Attoh, Nkrumah had no merit whatsoever other than the kind patronage he got from Ako Adjei.

To make this claim after 60 years makes one wonder about Attoh Quarshie’s sincerity. Others may want to question his sanity.

This ludicrous claim could have been made before Nkrumah's return in 1947 and it would have been considered sane. But now in 2019, when the evidence of the man’s worth is already established, is another matter!

After all, we have on record the competencies for both Nkrumah and Attoh Quarshie and the men of the UGCC. Thus, this claim can easily be marked as a strong suspect for lacking candor.

But the claim reveals something else. It reveals the arrogance found among some of the so-called British-trained intellectuals on the Gold Coast at the time, for whom Attoh had great respect.

After all, Nkrumah was trained in the US. He and his followers at the time were derided by the opposition as “verandah boys;” servants who slept on the porches of their masters!

Then, the shock of hearing Attoh’s lack of understanding of the required qualification for the post of the UGCC General Secretary at the time comes in. He says any elementary or high school graduate could have filled the position!

If the above were true, then either Attoh and his colleagues at the UGCC had no clue about the job to be done, or they were never really serious about getting that job done!

For heaven’s sake, we are talking about the leadership position for the job of freeing Ghana, a post of the spearhead of a movement and not a subordinate position. And Attoh has no idea of the qualification for the suitable candidate.

We have to thank our fortune that Nkrumah accepted the job.

Nkrumah’s training, degrees from American universities and writings were well documented and attested to by contemporaries of the time, including Ako Adjei, Attoh Quashie’s esteemed friend, and tribal comrade.

Nkrumah was already an intellectual giant, who would soon come to prove that he was the foremost transformational figure of Africa for the 20th century

Ako Adjei, among all the men of the UGCC, would know Nkrumah very well. They were both students in the United States. It was through Ako Adjei’s recommendation that Nkrumah was invited back to the Gold Coast for the UGCC General Secretary post.

If we were to believe Attoh Quarshie that Nkrumah was a wastrel, then Ako Adjei would have pushed an imposter, a nonachiever, a stranger, and non-Ghanaian on the nation.

But Ako Adjei didn't. He brought back a highly competent operator and a very astute politician as history has shown. Much is owed to Ako Adjei for his discernment. His good reputation must demand an apology from Attoh Quarshie.

Attoh may not know that the men of the UGCC made the right decision to recruit Nkrumah for Ghana, but he should accept that these men, incidentally, made the wrong call for their personal goals and ambitions.

And because of the failure, Nkrumah became the leader. Whatever he was, has already been proven by history.

Nkrumah had his chance on the world stage and did prove himself as a formidable thinker, a giant among politicians, and the foremost pan-Africanist of our time; more so than any other African of his era.

Thus, his reputation is something Ghanaians should be proud of and not one for Attoh Quashie to tarnish.

But we may forgive Attoh. Like many men of his generation, he never understood what the independent struggle was really about. This interview on "Foot Print" is the proof.

E. Ablorh-Odjidja, publisher, www.ghanadot.com, Washington, DC, October 17, 2019

Permission to publish: Please feel free to publish or reproduce, with credits, unedited. If posted on a website, email a copy of the web page to publisher@ghanadot.com. Or don't publish at all.

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