The author believes that the current challenges that Ghana is facing are largely due to the fact that the ruling elites have refused to learn from the past and continue making the same mistakes of opportunistic, short-sighted and divisive politics.   

The author argues that the failure of the Ghanaian Left to build on the legacy of Kwame Nkrumah is giving a good opportunity to the centre-right ruling party to develop and cement its neo-liberal ideology. 

The article deplores the current situation of the civil society in Ghana where the sector seems to be silent on important national issues including the violation of women’s rights and the plight of poor people. 

The author believes that the attempt to re-write Ghana’s history, especially the role and legacy of the country’s first President Kwame Nkrumah has woken up his sleeping supporters as well as his vision of a socialist Ghana.

In September 2018, leading pan-Africanists will gather in Accra, Ghana to celebrate the birthday of Osagyefo Doctor Kwame Nkrumah and to discuss ways of pushing the “Africa Must Unite” agenda. 

Since President Nana Akufo-Addo launched his “Ghana Beyond Aid” agenda we have been treated to the same partisan responses. Sadly, none of it goes beyond the usual partisan debate that we are used to hearing from our learned parliamentarians.

The 31 December 2018 revolution in Ghana was a political upheaval that promised and had the potential to deliver a Castro/Sankara type social and political revolution, but was wasted on the rubbish heap of personality power grab fuelled by the ambitions of one man, the collective theft of national resources by a cabal of opportunists and nation wreckers who perpetuated their vile corrupt values on the rest of the nation.  

One of the attributes of a middle income country is a rising middle class seeking the comforts of life, while the poor mass up at the fringes picking up crumbs from the table of the well to do. Ghana today is a place of unaffordable high-rise buildings, expensive restaurants, increase in domestic flights, expensive private schools - and unending political bigotry that could lead to the country’s implosion.

On 9 July, 2015, the Local Organizing Committee of the 8th Pan African Congress presented its final report to President John Mahama of Ghana. Zaya Yeebo presents his personal reflections of the 8th Congress held in Accra in March, 2015, observing that the Congress sought to revive the Movement, to reaffirm its anti-imperialist, anti-neo-colonialist nature and helped to define a path for the continued growth and regeneration of African economies and politics.

The countries reeling under the Ebola outbreak were recovering from prolonged conflict that had destroyed health infrastructures. Additionally, in the 1980s through the 1990s, these countries implemented neo-liberal reforms imposed by IMF and World Bank, whereby welfare systems were abandoned in exchange for donor support.

Ghana seems to have crossed the threshold of moral decency on a dangerous slope towards self-destruction and moral turpitude. It is now a dog-eat-dog society where those in power have abandoned the citizens to the wolves of private aggrandisement. Does the president see this?

Should those who took Ghana to the IMF in 1983 be allowed near economic decision-making in Ghana today? The country that until recently was touted as an example of ‘Africa rising’ is now in dire straits

As Africa seeks to reassert its independence, some forces in the West are doing all they can to stop “Africa rising.” As part of this, commentators who provide a different narrative from that of the West become a target of some western embassies in Africa. Those expressing views which seem to question western domination in Africa are particular targets

The International Criminal Court with its selective justice has become a vehicle for enforcing neocolonial interests in Africa. ICC has proven that it is beholden to countries that are not even signatories to the Rome statute that set it up.

Do the Kenyan youth understand the anti-colonial struggle of their forefathers? How about neo-colonialism and attempts to re-colonise Africa? Zaya Yeebo writes that serious efforts to jolt the youth into action should go beyond the dollars splurged by the US embassy in Nairobi.

The ‘global coalition’ is ultimately a mere front for the dominance of Western economic and political interests over genuine democratisation for the peoples of Africa, writes Zaya Yeebo.

With a focus on the role of ‘free and fair elections’ in promoting democracy, Zaya Yeebo takes a look at how electoral politics are shaping up across the continent. ‘The important consideration for the state, the media, civil society and political parties,’ says Yeebo, ‘is to work within an African framework, and for international supporters and interlopers to recognise the local reality, and not impose conditions based on geopolitical and economic interest.’

Following the completion of the Democratic Governance Civil Society Week (DG–CSW) in Kisumu, Western Province, Kenya, Zaya Yeebo rounds up the discussions and highlights the increasingly recognised need for civil society to demand the same accountability of itself that it does of the country's government.

cc Pan-Africanism is not just a throwback to the post-colonial period, writes Zaya Yeebo, the people of Africa are still ‘united by culture, history and identity’. Africans around the continent feel each other’s pain and are bound together as a people by events, says Yeebo, whether it is the struggle for emancipation in the Niger Delta, or the crisis in the DRC. Charting a history of the Pan-African Movement from the first conference in 1900 to the present day, Yeebo calls for Pan-African solutions to African problems, with Pan-Africanism as a ‘collective understanding’ of how ‘we intend to conduct our affairs in today’s globalised world’.

cc While acknowledging that Kenya's Grand Coalition Government (GCG) has given rise to much debate and commentary, Zaya Yeebo argues that civil society's ability to influence change without violence is often ignored. Though other African countries see their people's voices expressed through groups such as trade unions and youth organisations, Kenyans' voices are muted by the noisy contestations of the country's political elites. The tendency of the last few years to 'franchise' the role of civil society out to international NGOs must be challenged, Yeebo contends, and Kenyans must look to the recent examples provided by Ghana, Sierra Leone and South Africa of how people power can bring about change. But while Kenyan civil society can draw inspiration and even support from outside, it alone must work to stoke popular pressure if effective and lasting political reform is to be achieved, Yeebo concludes.