**Ghana: Elections 2005
Ghana is still experiencing some shocks in its political economy in the country’s attempt to deal with its post-military, prolonged authoritarian past. "While alternation of power is seen to have helped in the consolidation of the democratic process, there are fears that severe security problems triggered by lack of access to resources might create further security challenges," says an article in the journal Democracy & Development: Journal of West African Affairs, published by the The Centre for Democracy and Development, a non-governmental organisation which aims to promote the values of democracy, peace & human rights in Africa and in the West African sub-region. Published last year and based on a study in 2002, the article makes for interesting reading ahead of Ghana's election next week. The study also concludes that:
- Government policies to redress poverty and other socio-economic concerns have just reached the implementation stages. Progress made so far is commendable, but challenges remain.
- The internal threats that Ghana has to confront are potentially dangerous. Many of them have to do with who lost power, who has gained power and who is wielding power. In dealing with them, Government has to adopt an institutional approach that does not paint its actions as patently partisan.
- The threat from the neighbouring Cote d’Ivoire given the recent crisis is by far the most critical facing the country.
>>>>> For the full article, visit http://www.cdd.org.uk/pdf/ghana.pdf
NEWS: ELECTIONS 2005
President John Kufuor is on course to win a second term as the opposition candidate struggles to emerge as his own man, analysts said last Friday. Kufuor, of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), will face his main rival John Atta Mills of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and other minor candidates on 7 December. If no-one wins more than 50 percent of the vote, there will be a run-off but most commentators think that unlikely.
>>>>>For the full article, visit http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=44383
COMMENTARY: ELECTIONS 2005
Quassy Adjapawn
Politics in Ghana has come a long way. Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the first President of Ghana, and his Convention People’s Party in 1957 achieved the symbolic status of making Ghana the first black African colony to gain independence and subsequently became the first independent African member of the British Commonwealth. Ghana became the symbol of African liberation and as such attracted an inordinate amount of attention from the West.
Since then Ghana has suffered a series of coup d'tats, amongst them the 1966 military takeover led by General Kotoka and in 1972, Colonel Acheampong’s overthrow of the second republic. The year 1978 marked a palace coup to restructure the military regime and in 1979, there was a coup by junior military officers led by Jerry Rawlings. Rawlings staged another coup in 1981 to overthrow the constitutional People’s National Party (PNP) government in the third republic.
>>>>>Click on the link below to read the full article.
GHANA: ELECTIONS 2005
Quassy Adjapawn
Politics in Ghana has come a long way. Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the first President of Ghana, and his Convention People’s Party in 1957 achieved the symbolic status of making Ghana the first black African colony to gain independence and subsequently became the first independent African member of the British Commonwealth. Ghana became the symbol of African liberation and as such attracted an inordinate amount of attention from the West.
Since then Ghana has suffered a series of coup d'tats, amongst them the 1966 military takeover led by General Kotoka and in 1972, Colonel Acheampong’s overthrow of the second republic. The year 1978 marked a palace coup to restructure the military regime and in 1979, there was a coup by junior military officers led by Jerry Rawlings. Rawlings staged another coup in 1981 to overthrow the constitutional People’s National Party (PNP) government in the third republic.
The political history of Ghana reveals that coup d'tats are ethnic based. Dr Kwame Nkrumah's government was toppled by a predominantly opposing ethnic group which also got ousted in a similar manner by another opposing group. This has also been a trend in the numerous takeovers by military regimes.
On the 7th of December, Ghanaians will decide again through the ballot box who will steer the affairs of the nation for the next four years. The ultimate question that can be posed to Ghanaians is: “What does this upcoming election mean to them, taking into consideration the crisis in the West African region and the continent at large?”
The main participating parties contesting in the upcoming elections on the 7th of December include: the Convention Peoples Party (CPP), the Great Consolidated Popular Party (GCPP), the New Patriotic Party (NPP), the National Democratic Congress (NDC), the Peoples National Convention (PNC) and several other minor parties. The expectations of the people are that, either one of the two major parties: the New Patriotic Party (NPP) led by the incumbent president John Kufuor or the National Democratic Congress (NDC) led by Prof. Atta Mills could win.
Historically, politics in Ghana had been described in some circles as driven along ethnic lines where the electorate votes according to their descent and not on the aspirations of the candidate. Though this assertion may hold water to some extent, the last two elections have proved otherwise. However, some pessimists say if effort is not made at addressing the issue, Ghana will gradually drift to a situation where the nation states will give way to ethnic states, thus defying the spirit of nationalism and patriotism that Nkrumah and his compatriots fought indefatigably to build.
Events in Ghana do not take place in isolation from Africa as a whole or from the regional destabilisation in West Africa. Africa is an incredibly rich continent but remains the home of the poorest people on earth. 340 million Africans, about half of the population of the continent, live on less than $1.00 a day and the infant mortality rate is 140 per 1000. The average life expectancy is 54 years. At the close of the year 2000, Africans with HIV/AIDS accounted for 70% of the cases recorded in the world.
Ghana itself is ranked at 131st position out of 177 countries in the Human Development Index scale. Birth and death rates are 24.9 and 10.67 per population of thousand respectively. The infant mortality rate is 52.22 deaths per population of thousand and the life expectancy is only 56.3 years. The HIV/AIDS prevalence rate is 3.1 percent.
The situations in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Ivory Coast where conflicts have taken lives and destroyed statehood should act as a reproach to opponents of democracy who might want to resort to the less democratic tendencies of Ghana’s history. Citizens of Ghana, politicians and ethnic elites should also learn from the current show of people's power in Ukraine where voters have poured on to the streets to express anger at irregularities in the recent vote count. Should the upcoming voting in Ghana be deemed unfair, it is up to the people to rise and demand a change.
Political clashes between party activists are causing tensions in Ghana. Freedom of speech and association are parts of Ghanaian culture and as such political maturity should be exercised in this crucial hour in order not to cause tempers to flare. The outcome of a politically unstable nation is poverty, and a country which is thrown into disarray and scattered with refugees.
* Quassy Adjapawn is with the School of Professional Development and Leadership, Peace Studies, University of New England. His research interests centre on ethnic conflicts in Northern Ghana, particularly the conflict-poverty nexus, recovery, reconstruction and reconciliation, peace processes, peacekeeping, peacemaking and peace building, non-violence and non-violent action. ([email protected])
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