From: gpope@iat.holonet.net (george pope)
Subject: Questionnaire, 3 from Pioneer of Kumasi
Followup-To: <1992Jul30.002554.20277@iat.holonet.net>
Organization: HoloNet Internet BBS: 510-704-1058
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 00:28:57 GMT


  (NEWS!BKS)

   
  QUESTIONNAIRE: 
           
  1.Do you often seek out BBSs and conferences that have 
  African, American, Caribbean spins?  




   
  2.On your BBS or news group what do you most want from 
  Africa?  News, Pen Pals, Business Opportunities, 
  Music, Literature, Travel Info?                       
        



                      
   
  3.Beyond functioning as efficient meeting places how 
  might BBS's better serve as cultural resources 
  interconnectors? 
    




  4.Have you traveled in Africa? the Caribbean? What 
  countries?  
   




  5.Please state the city and country of your current 
  residence.  If you were not born in the U.S. please 
  tell us where you are from.  
   




  6.Would you like to be regularly notified of foreign 
  visitors in your area, where they are from, what they 
  do etc.? 
                 




  7.Undoubtedly you would like to see fresh newspaper 
  stories from the African and the Caribbean online. 
  Well enough to pay a modest fee for it? (quality and 
  diversity assumed). 
   




  8.Which if any African American newspapers do you read? 
   




  9.Would you like to see more African and Caribbean news 
  in these papers (made available for selection and down 
  loading from a net)?  As well as on your favorite BBS? 





  10.In what areas; Politics, slices of peoples daily lives 
  stories, editorial opinion, business opportunities, 
  sports, music and arts, religious news including 
  Islam?  




  11.Please recommend newspapers for electronic 
  distribution? 
    




  12.Could you be induced to subscribe to a local African 
  American newspaper that systematically carried African 
  and Caribbean news?  
   




  13.If you are a business operator would carrying this 
  news influence your decisions on the placement of 
  advertising?   
   




  14.Providing that POLITICAL REFLECTIONS ON THE MOTHERLAND 
  "interested" you, would you pay $5.00 to register as a 
  shareware user?  Buy it through a doorway? (Enough 
  "yeses" and the Motherland shall go to press 
  immediately.)              





  15.If this bbs participated in a doorway publication of 6 
  or 12  African titles per year would you be interested 
  in subscribing to an OnLine African Book Club at a fee 
  of $35 or $72?  Would you participate in online 
  literary discussion, as well as vote in the selection 
  of new titles.   
   




  16.I assume that you review and regularly use lots of 
  shareware as well as a number of Bulletin Boards. How 
  many registration, membership and doorway fees have 
  you actually paid within the past year? How much did 
  you annually spend on these?  
   




  17.What is your criteria either for paying or not paying 
  user fees?  
   




  18.Are you aware of any previous "Shareware Literary 
  Publication" trials?  If so, what were the results? 
    




  19.How much time do you devote each week to informing 
  yourself on international affairs?  How much more time 
  will you be able to devote to this area once improved 
  electronic African, American and Caribbean 
  interconnection services become available?   
   




       Thanking you in advance for your consideration in 
  answering these questions. I will share findings with you 
  on this bbs.  Your answers will help us bring the things 
  you want from Africa at least to your computer. Please 
  append further suggestions as they occur to you. Please 
  stay in touch.  
         
  George Pope, 2280 Bunker Hill Dr., San Mateo, CA 94402 
  (voice 415-574-2799), George Pope on The Blacknet, gpope on 
  other boards and gpope@holonet.net.





  =======================================================
  EXCERPTS FROM:  POLITICAL REFLECTION ON THE MOTHERLAND
  =======================================================

 THE PIONEER, June 29, 1991
 Confusion At Accra Bukom Square As MFJ
 Tries To Hold Rally
 From Ivor Agyeman-Duah, Accra

       Another attempt by the pro-democracy force, the 

 Movement for Freedom and Justice (MFJ) to hold a rally at 

 Bukom Square in Accra on Saturday, was frustrated.

       On the eve of Saturday, there were all indications to 

 this effect as posters announcing the rally and its detail 

 programme were removed from Bukom Square and other parts of 

 Accra by people the MFJ suspected to be security agents.

       According to some of the residents at Bukom Square 

 that I talked to, as early as 4am, many steel-helmetted 

 policemen in jeeps, armed and with whistles, started 

 patrolling the area.

       Around 6am when some of the organisers of the MFJ went 

 to the Bukom Square to fix their canopies, and public 

 address systems, they found that the Committee for the 

 Defence of the Revolution (CDR) were also erecting canopies 

 and organising the area to also hold a rally.

       By mid morning, some of the residents said there was 

 an Accra Metropolitan Assembly vehicle going round and 

 campaigning that people should not attend the MFJ's rally 

 and should be wary of the MFJ.

       When I got to the area at about 11 am, the Bukom 

 Square (a strip of land about the size of a football field), 

 was the scene of a heavily guarded and armed policemen with 

 some riding on horses patrolling the area and beyond.

       The National Executives of the MFJ led by Prof. Adu 

 Boahen, Messrs. Jonny Hansen, Kwasi Pratt Jnr., Akoto Ampaw, 

 Dan Lartey and others, went to the James Town Police Station 

 to make enquiries about the police presence at their venue 

 of the rally. When the police asked if they had obtained a 

 permit before attempting to hold the rally, they said no but 

 demanded in turn, if the police were at the Square because 

 of the MFJ?

       The police however, told the executives that their 

 profession is such that they could be anywhere and at any 

 time. Later when the press (local and international) went to 

 the police, we were told the MFJ did not apply for a permit.

       When I asked Mr. Kwesi Pratt, why that mistake, he 

 said the MFJ had applied on three different occasions for a 

 permit but were refused so, they thought there was no need. 

 Prof. Adu Boahen also confirmed this and added that if the 

 CDR'S and the 3lst December Women's Movement could hold 

 rallies without permits, he did not understand why the issue 

 of permit was being used against the MFJ.

       After a short meeting by the executive of the MFJ, it 

 was decided that members and sympathisers who had come 

 should meet at the Round-about in front of the General Post 

 Office for a short address by Prof. Adu Boahen and Mr. Jonny 

 Hansen.

       Suddenly about 50 armed policemen drove to the Round-

 about as Kwesi Pratt and Akoto Ampaw, with others had by 

 then started talking to the people and preaching against 

 what they called the dictatorship of the PNDC government. 

       As the police approached the gathering, Mr. Kwesi 

 Pratt ordered that the crowd including the press, should 

 squat in the street. By this time, the traffic had been 

 blocked and many were watching the scene from stores and 

 other building around the area. 

       But if the situation did not degenerate into a tense 

 or bad one, it was due to tactful manner in which Chief 

 Supt. S.A. Nyante of the Accra Central Division handled the 

 situation.

       From the Round-about, the MfJ members and those who 

 had come to the rally, went to a nearby house where Prof. 

 Adu Boahen and Mr. Hansen gave short speeches. 

       Mr. Jonny Hansen said the CDR's were given permit on 

 that very Saturday to also use the Bukom Square to legally 

 weaken the MFJ and as a form of confrontation and 

 intimidation by the PNDC government.

       He said the MFJ would apply again for permit and that 

 within two weeks, they would organise another rally at the 

 "same Bukom Square whether rain or shine and with all 

 defiance."

       Prof. Adu Boahen on his part said the MFJ had achieved 

 its objectives of organising the rally. He said the rally 

 was meant to test the democratic pulse of the PNDC which 

 they had failed and proved their insincerity and also to 

 test the determination of the MFJ's support which they had 

 passed.

       The time was about 3 p.m. when the gathering finally 

 dissolved.





 ===========================================================
 THE PIONEER, 13th August, 1991
 Poor, Poor, O.A.U.!
 By K.S.P. Jantuah



     The foundation of the Organization of African Unity 

 (O.A.U.) has now entered upon the perilous process of giving 

 way and sinking because it can no longer support the weight 

 of its superstructure of chauvinist dictatorships and 

 autocracies which now make the bulk of its state membership. 

     The threat of annihilation of the fundamental principle 

 of unity animating the Organization is of great concern not 

 only because I am African but also because the first formal 

 steps towards the formation of the Organization happened to 

 have to have been entrusted to me as Ghana's Acting High 

 Commissioner in London when on instruction of Kwame Nkrumah, 

 Prime Minister, I called together in a meeting, the first 

 ever of its kind, all the Ambassadors and heads of Mission 

 of Independent African States in London in 1958 to discuss 

 the idea of a Conference of Heads of Independent African 

 States at Accra on an Agenda including African unity to be 

 agreed at a future date though usual diplomatic channels.

     Mr. Alex Quaison-Sackey (as he then was) was the High 

 Commission's Official Secretary.  There were at the time 

 only eight Independent States in all Africa:  Egypt, Ghana, 

 Sudan, Libya, Tunisia, Liberia, Ethiopia and Morocco, and 

 they were, as luck would have it, all accredited to the 

 Court of St. James's and resident in London too.



 ACCRA CONFERENCE

     Several meetings were held with the venue rotating from 

 one Embassy to another, which eventually led to the first 

 Conference of Independent African States held at Accra in 

 April, 1958 at which were represented all the eight African 

 States.  This Conference was the prototype of the 

 Organization of African Unity otherwise recorded by Kwame 

 Nkrumah at Page 137 of his book 'Africa Must Unite' and I 

 quote "The Accra Conference resulted, as indeed I hoped it 

 would, in a great upsurge of interest in the cause of 

 African Freedom and Unity."

     Following upon the tremendous success of the Conference, 

 the realization of the first concrete step towards the 

 political union of Africa dawned who in 1958 Ghana, under 

 the leadership of Kwame Nkrumah, and Guinea, under Sekou 

 Toure's, united and became a nucleus for a Union of African 

 States which was joined by President Modibo Keita's Mali in 

 1960 and was then christened as 'Union of African 

 States'(U.A.S.) and in the fullness of time the 

 "Organization of African Unity" (OAU) was brought into being 

 when 34 founding Member--States signed its Charter at Cairo, 

 United Republic, on 21st July, 1964.



 THE STORY OF O.A.U.

     The name of the organization itself tells its own story 

 and is an eloquent expression of its aim and ultimate 

 destination which is African Unity. Now, it was within the 

 fervent and legitimate contemplation of the Founding Fathers 

 that the O.A.U. should reach its destination in their own 

 lives and towards this achievement they toiled and made 

 public pronouncements and declarations which showed their 

 political will to surrender the whole or part of the 

 sovereignty of their countries in furtherance of African 

 Unity.

     Indeed for the Founding Fathers this political will to 

 unity was so paramount in their political priorities that 

 several of them translated these statements of intentions to 

 cede sovereignty in the form of provisions in their 

 country's Constitutions, the basic law of the land.  And 

 Ghana, for example, at Part I Article 2 of her 1960 

 Republican Constitution provided that "in the confident 

 expectation of an early surrender of sovereignty to a Union 

 of African States and Territories, the People now confer on 

 Parliament the power to provide for the surrender of the 

 whole or any part of the sovereignty of Ghana: Provided that 

 the Sovereignty of Ghana shall not be surrendered or 

 diminished on any grounds other than the furtherance of 

 African Unity."  Guinea made similar provision in her 

 Constitution and so did Tunisia, Egypt and Mali.



 THREATENED UNITY

     Such positive actions could not have been taken unless 

 the Founding Fathers wished to demonstrate their utter and 

 irreversible commitment to the early achievement of unity 

 for Africa.  And yet today, more than a quarter of a century 

 after its birth, the Unity of Africa has not only eluded her 

 but even the Organization, the vehicle for the attainment of 

 the UNITY is gravely threatened by acts and omissions which 

 are not only inconsistent with but also destructive of one 

 of its basic concepts of the observance of a concerted 

 diplomacy calculated to achieve a common orientation of 

 Foreign Policy of Member States.



 THE LITTLE TYRANTS

     The present category of the political leadership of the 

 Member States is at the heart of the O.A.U.'s morass in that 

 most of the Heads of its Member States who control the 

 destiny of the Organization  are either men who have seized 

 power by a military coup and imposed themselves on their 

 people as leaders or who, having come to power through 

 democratic processes, have since become little tyrants and 

 unless the member countries retrace their steps back to 

 democratic rule, as most are in the process of doing so now, 

 all else would not make an overall redemption of the 

 Organization from complete collapse any likely.

     The reason seems to be that dictators and autocrats 

 would sooner go through the eye of a needle than readily 

 accept the view point of one another, which tends to 

 restrict one another's preconceived notions or modus 

 operandi and because they have very little respect for 

 democratic means and methods which to them are but tedious 

 contraptions, they naturally spurn these and do things after 

 their own manner.

     A telling example may be found in the shabby and 

 bungling manner which the political leaders of the Economic 

 Community of West African States (ECOWAS) handled, and are 

 still handling, through their so-called Peace Keeping Force 

 - ECOMOG the Liberian Civil War.

     When ECOWAS decided to intervene in the crisis, they 

 were fully aware that the cause of the war was the inhuman 

 and autocratic rule of Master Sergeant Doc which the 

 Liberian people could no longer bear.  ECOWAS very well knew 

 also that the only thing the Liberian people wanted and were 

 determined to do was to get dictator Doc off their backs and 

 return their county to the rule of law and order.

     In spite however of the awareness of the will and 

 determination of Liberians in the matter, ECOWAS leaders 

 despatched their warring machinery ECOMOG to Liberia not to 

 help them get rid of Doc and achieve their goal by putting 

 pressure on and strongly advising Doc to throw in the towel 

 and leave Liberia and go and hide, after the manner of 

 fallen dictators, in an ECOWAS country and there to spend 

 the rest of his wretched life and enjoy his ill-gotten 

 wealth in bliss, the ECOWAS leaders on the contrary sent 

 ECOMOG to Liberia to try and force the patriotic armies of 

 Charles Taylor and Prince Johnson to lay down their arms and 

 go and negotiate peace with Doc who was still in command of 

 the murdering and implacable national Armed Forces of 

 Liberia at his beck and call.

     The truth is that the political leaders of ECOWAS were 

 of course not competent to tell dictator Doc to resign and 

 go away because they perceived him as an image of 

 themselves, their own reflection.  And if they had dared to, 

 Doc with the pleasure of the last laugh still on his face, 

 would have quite rightly retorted: medice, cura teipsum and 

 if he knew a little about the sayings of Christ, would have 

 admonished his colleagues Heads of State to go and remove 

 the beams in their own eyes first!



 PETTY NATIONALISTIC JEALOUSIES

     Now, the current decision of the O.A.U. to present a 

 long list of six O.A.U sponsored candidates to the United 

 Nations for that body to select and appoint one of the six 

 to succeed Mr. Perez de Cuellar as the General Secretary of 

 the U.N. on his impending retirement, does emphasize the 

 boggling array of deeds and misdeeds which derive from petty 

 nationalistic jealousies and personal vanities 

 characteristic of leaders who are out of touch with their 

 people and insensitive to their desires and needs.

     From whatever angle it is looked at, except that of 

 muddled thinking, the decision is a gratuitous portrayal of 

 the conception which the enemies and detractors of Africa 

 have in diverse ways and modes given vent to about Africa, 

 its peoples and things African.

     They have called us infants and children.  We have very 

 angrily and loudly protested and proclaimed that we are 

 grown-ups and adults and yet by the things we do and those 

 we fail to do, we Africans afford our friends cause for 

 embarrassment and our detractors unsolicited confirmation of 

 the contemptible perception they have of Africa's capability 

 of achieving anything on her own.

     The decision is the evidence.  It is about the most 

 disgraceful admission by the O.A.U. of the betrayal of its 

 own Charter.



 THE O.A.U. AND THE U.N.

     It may be as well here to recall the occurrence of a 

 similar situation in 1964 at the United Nations when it came 

 to Africa's turn to present Africa's candidate for election 

 by the U.N. to preside over the 19th Session of its General 

 Assembly.  Not unlike today, nationalistic pride reared its 

 ugly head and many a member state of the young O.A.U. showed 

 interest in having its citizen chosen as candidate for the 

 honour of the Presidency of the U.N. General Assembly.

     After a series of diplomatic interaction among the 

 O.A.U. a long list of possible candidates was whittled down 

 to that of only two candidates representing Ghana and 

 Liberia.  Liberia was the oldest Independent African State 

 and very well known and influential as well especially with 

 the United States of America and its allies at the U.N. 

 Ghana on the other hand was the first Black African county 

 to rid itself of the yoke of colonialism and this, among 

 other things, worked like magic conjuring up the admiration 

 and good will of a great many members within both the O.A.U. 

 and the U.N. as well.

     This was a partial solution and did not help anything 

 much as it only meant that the competition had then boiled 

 down to a straight fight between the two groupings within 

 the O.A.U. i.e.  the so-called Monrovia Group of states 

 backing the Liberian sponsored candidate and the so-called 

 Casablanca Group which favoured Ghana's nominee.

     The situation thus became stalemated and threatened to 

 end in Africa putting forward, just as now, more than one 

 candidate to the U.N. for it to choose one of them for the 

 presidency of its General Assembly but for intensified 

 diplomacy between President Tubman of Liberia and President 

 Kwame Nkrumah coupled with goodwill and give and take on 

 both sides, Africa was enabled at last to give, in the 

 interest of African solidarity, only one choice to the world 

 body for it to elect, who happened to be the then Ghana's 

 Permanent Representative at the U.N. Mr. Alex Quaison-Sackey 

 (as he then was) and became the first African to preside 

 over a General Assembly of the United Nations Organization.

     This was a decisive victory for African unity and 

 solidarity, in which there were no individual losers and no 

 individual winners and a persuasive show of the political 

 will towards common orientation in the area of Foreign 

 Policy of Member states of the budding O.A.U.



 NIGERIA'S CANDIDATE

     Today, as yesterday, the internal competition among 

 Member States of the O.A.U. has nothing much to do with the 

 contention as to which candidate is more suitably qualified 

 for the U.N. post because, except in one instance, all the 

 other five candidates are very well qualified and suitable 

 to be appointed General Secretary of the U.N.

     The problem is really one of upsurgence of petty 

 national pride and loss of sight of the bottom line 

 objective of the O.A.U. as primordially conceived by the 

 Founding Fathers and enshrined in its Charter.

     But what is rather bewildering is that Nigeria, a much 

 respected member state of the O.A.U. should go to the 

 stunning extent of fielding for appointment to the highest 

 honour of the position of the world's most democratic as 

 well as constitutional organization one of her former 

 military dictators, a person who betrayed his country's 

 constitution which it was his duty to uphold and defend, a 

 person who subverted law and order of his country to enable 

 him to impose his will on his countrymen and women and 

 arbitrarily rule over them!

     Remember that once an outlaw always an outlaw.  And in 

 any event, what guarantee have the world and the U.N. that 

 as General Secretary the one time dictator would not use his 

 privileged position to subvert the constitution and the 

 noble ideals and ideas of the World's foremost organ of hope 

 for keeping, of World peace, law and order and security for 

 all its people?

     Ought the peoples of the world be made once against to 

 suffer another round of humiliation and contumely if, like 

 in the case of Dr. Kurt Waldheim formerly U.N. General 

 Secretary and now Australia's embarrassing Federal 

 President, the Nigeria's former dictator's record of 

 involvement in military brutalities during his totalitarian 

 rule should in time catch up with him and prove him to have 

 been unworthy of the appointment on at least moral grounds?

     If great Nigeria must, like all the other O.A.U. 

 Members, continue to aid and abet the rat race for the 

 General Secretaryship, let her present an acceptable 

 citizen, for after all Nigeria has no shortage even of 

 better qualified and more competent persons in terms of 

 intellectual political, diplomatic and moral excellence.



 THE RAT RACE

     In any case, the rat race must be stopped now before it 

 gravely besmirched the bona fides of the political leaders 

 of the O.A.U. for which there is yet but little time.  This 

 can be done by an immediate resumption of diplomatic 

 consultations among heads of member states either through 

 special Emissaries or perhaps by a Heads of State Summit to 

 try and resolve the deadlock on the issue of the appointment 

 on the basis of African solidarity and give and take and 

 thereby arrive at a timely selection of one of the 

 candidates excluding Nigeria's ex-dictator who may be 

 replaced by another Nigerian sponsored candidate to be 

 considered along with the five others if Nigeria so desired.

     There is little doubt however that in the event where 

 five or more African candidates were placed before the U.N. 

 no candidate would obtain the required number of votes to be 

 elected for appointment and thus the strange hope 

 entertained by the architects of this farcical comedy of six 

 pawns, that the more candidates Africa presented the more 

 certain it would be to secure the appointment of one of 

 them, would sorely be disappointed.

     There is now more than ever before a great need for a 

 shrewd and selfless political leadership on the part of all 

 member states of the O.A.U. and especially a little 

 sacrifice among those member states sponsoring their 

 nationals so that the paramountcy of the integrity of 

 African unity and solidarity might be upheld and maintained.

     There should not be allowed to exist any cost or trouble 

 too great to bear for the sake of keeping firmly intact the 

 principles and objectives which the Founding Fathers 

 including Abdul Nasser, Emperor Haile Sellassie and our own 

 Kwame Nkrumah conceived and laid down for the Organization.



 GHANA AS LEADER

     Ghana has always played a leader's role in times of 

 crisis within the O.A.U. and it is once again such a time 

 now for her to take the crusading banner and offer the 

 initial ray of hope for the undoing or even cutting the 

 Gordian knot of the Puzzling agreement to disagree on the 

 choice of one single nominee by Africa for Africa for the 

 U.N. post of General Secretary, which now very seriously 

 indeed risks to emasculate Africa's premier Organization.

     What Ghana needs to do now for a start is for her to 

 make a firm declaration of her intention of readiness to 

 withdraw unilaterally and without pre-conditions her 

 sponsorship of her national Mr. Kenneth Dadzie from the race 

 in furtherance of African solidarity and unity just in the 

 same way as Ghana has over the years committed herself to 

 the surrender, either in part or in whole, of her 

 sovereignty in pursuance of the unity of our continent and 

 its nearby islands.

     The declaration of intention should, in a few days 

 afterwards, be transformed into action by the effective 

 withdrawal of her sponsorship of Mr. Kenneth Dadzie, which 

 could be almost a mortal blow to the competent success of 

 the effort to get a well qualified and suitable African to 

 succeed such a giant as the present incumbent of the General 

 Secretaryship of the world organization.

     But Mr. Dadzie as well as his countrymen and women of 

 Ghana and indeed all lovers of Africa's unity and solidarity 

 would not fail to appreciate the singular nobility of the 

 sacrifice.



 KOJO SHOULD ACT

     Ghana is, in this regard, in luck to have Capt. Kojo 

 Tsikata, a true Nkrumaist and admirer of Kwame Nkrumah (at 

 any rate he was and once a true Nkrumaist, always 

 Nkrumaist!) as Member of the ruling Provisional National 

 Defence Council (PNDC) responsible for the Ministry of 

 Foreign Affairs.

     Ghana would like to count on Capt Tsikata to take up the 

 daunting but however not invincible challenge and use his 

 immense power and influence to carry the PNDC as well as his 

 other colleagues with him to bring about an honourable 

 reversal of the unprecedented and baffling decision to 

 confront the U.N. with a six headed monster of a candidature 

 to chose from for the post of General Secretary of the U.N.

     Ghana the O.A.U. and the rest of the world are anxiously 

 looking on and waiting for action and so please act and act 

 quickly to redeem the integrity of the Organization of 

 African Unity and to reassert with renewed confidence its 

 right to continue in existence in the form and content as 

 the Founding Fathers conceived it.



 ============================================================
 THE PIONEER, January 10,1991
 The Politics of Our Motherland
 By Ivor Agyercan-Duah

      A symposium organised by the Institute of African 

 Studies, University of Ghana, on "The City of Kumasi: Past, 

 Present and the Future" was held in Kumasi last December.

     The symposium which drew scholars from the University of 

 Ghana, the United Kingdom and the United States dealt with 

 the culture, sociology, commercial, and industrial 

 developments in Kumasi and the politics of its people.

     I met the Director of the Institute of African Studies, 

 University of Ghana, Professor Kwame Arhin, at the symposium 

 and talked to him about the public debates in Ghana with 

 emphasis on his role in the Kumasi one, and on the political 

 issues generally.


 QUESTION:  KUMASI IS POLITICALLY A VERY SENSITIVE AREA IN 
 GHANA. SOME CALL IT THE "NERVE CENTRE" OF GHANAIAN POLITICS. 
 GOVERNMENTS ARE MINDFUL OF HOW THEY TREAT THIS CITY.  WHAT 
 DO YOU THINK HAS MADE THE CITY SO?

                           CIVIL WAR

     ANSWER:  Between 1885 - 1888, the Asantes fought a civil 

 war over the principles of their constitution, over whether 

 or not a queenmother could have her own son as King. 

     They also fought over the principle of taxation, on 

 whether the state could be an instrument of development or 

 there should be private enterprise.  If in the nineteenth 

 century people were so sophisticated to fight over those 

 things, then you can understand the political posture of the 

 city.

     Part of this tradition is that the people are not 

 terrified of governments. They always speak their minds in 

 the tradition of political discussion.  So it is a political 

 tradition.

     Asantes are not a people who say because that man in 

 power is their fellow tribesman, they are going to do 

 whatever he says. They are a people who have a tradition of 

 dissent.



 QUESTION:  DURING THE RECENT POLITICAL DEBATE IN KUMASI, 
 PEOPLE COMMENTED THAT YOU DECIDED NOT TO TAKE A STAND OR 
 COMMIT YOURSELF. THIS WAS CONTRARY TO EXPECTATION.

     ANSWER:  That is true. I was invited and an intellectual 

 is somebody who generates ideas. My brief I think, was to 

 prepare the frame-work in which the discussions could take 

 place. In that capacity, I was different from a politician 

 who had a message to deliver. I was asked to come and help 

 in the discussion.

                     DOUBT ABOUT DEMOCRACY

     If anybody thought that I was afraid, that was not so. 

 Honestly I hesitate in this matter because I have 

 considerable doubt about the survival of democracy in Ghana 

 looking at the conditions in which we find ourselves.

     Democracy is supposed to be a permanent dialogue between 

 the rulers and the ruled.  I always place emphasis on 

 economic conditions when I talk of democracy.

     If Ghana could find a clear-headed person, somebody who 

 can transform the country economically, get the best people 

 to help him, I will support that person.

 QUESTION:  WAS IT BASED ON THIS ARGUMENT THAT YOU SAID YOU 
 WERE NOT A PROPHET TO TELL THE FUTURE OF THIS COUNTRY?


     ANSWER:  Yes, they say one should talk of the future and 

 I only tell the future by studying statistics and I am not a 

 statistician. On the other hand, you could prophesise after 

 seeing visions and I have not seen visions.  But I am aware 

 of the difficulties and uncertainties in Ghanaian politics. 

 QUESTION:  IT'S A TRITE ARGUMENT THAT THE MILITARY HAS NOT 
 GIVEN THE CIVILIANS A CHANCE TO SHOW THEIR COMPETENCE OR 
 OTHERWISE IN THE POLITICS OF THIS COUNTRY. ANY COMMENT?

     ANSWER:  If we all accept the democratic postulate, it 

 means we are going to allow people to elect their rulers and 

 to make their judgements as to whether or not they are 

 performing well. That is the core of the matter.

                      DEMOCRATIC PROCESS

     How can you trust the judgement of one or two soldiers 

 who stage a coup? Or how can you say that their judgement is 

 better than mine or yours?  Once we accept the democratic 

 process we should allow it to go to the finish.

     The people elect Mr. A or B and at the end of five 

 years, they can say whether or not A or B has performed 

 well. Some soldiers come to power and say ridiculous things 

 like "the few amenities we were enjoying have been whittled 

 away..." What kind of rubbish is that?

     Some even said they dreamt and God told them they would 

 be great men so they used weapons to effect God's alleged 

 intentions. On what grounds can a soldier think he can judge 

 a government better than I can do?

     No group of individuals can substitute their judgement 

 for the judgement of the people. Sometimes I am surprised to 

 read in the newspapers such nonsense like "the civilians 

 have had a chance". I mean it's nonsense; and people didn't 

 riot and there was no breakdown of law and order. 

     In spite of all that the Limann government was doing 

 nobody demonstrated against them. So how could anybody say 

 that they have failed?

     Are we richer than we were in Limann's time?



                       TRUE REFLECTIONS

 QUESTION:  THE REGIONAL DEBATES ON THE FUTURE OF THE COUNTRY 
 ARE OVER. THE NCD IS YET TO COME OUT WITH ITS FINDINGS AND 
 PEOPLE HAVE EXPRESSED DOUBTS ABOUT HOW THE NCD CAN COME OUT 
 WITH A TRUE REFLECTION OF THE EXERCISE. WHAT DO YOU ALSO 
 THINK ABOUT THEIR IDEA OF "GOING BACK TO OUR ROOTS" 
 ASSOCIATED WITH THE DEBATES?

     ANSWER:  A Greek philosopher once said you cannot step 

 in a river twice. The logic of this "going back to our 

 roots" means giving power back to the chiefs. Is it not so?

     We have a new country altogether, we want another set of 

 values not those values of the past. The tribes in Ghana 

 have different traditions, customs and institutions. I won't 

 buy that idea. What I will buy is a genuine person who will 

 come to power and say "fellow Ghanaians, let us put our 

 heads together and transform our country by reducing the 

 misery".

     On the NCD, I am thinking of whether they can reach a 

 consensus. I doubt this but know that it will not be the end 

 of the process. During the Acheampong era, he called me, the 

 late B.D. Addai, and J.A. Opoku to the Castle and whilst 

 with him, he told us how he was very much concerned with 

 UNIGOV idea. He said he had somebody at the Castle who was 

 collating views.

 civilians? Is it not only threats? What about adequate 

 housing, clothing, medical facilities, food and other 

 necessities of life for the past 10 years.

     Does it deserve to use the image or name of the       
 Eagle to perpetuate its inhuman rule in the 4th Republic?   

                      

 iii   Exodus 19:4                                           

  "....How I carried you on eagle's wings and brought you to 

 myself...."

      After spending two or three months in the security of 

 the nest, the young eaglet is ready to learn to fly. The 

 first flight is unusually from the nest to a rock, but on 

 subsequent flights the adult eagle may actually accompany 

 the eaglet using its primary feathers to create an air 

 current which lifts the eaglet. Some of us have always been 

 of the impression that eagles actually carry their young on 

 their wings, dropping them into the abyss and then diving to 

 catch them, taking them higher each time. I always thought 

 that by principle of "must do" being a good master eaglets 

 learn to fly.

                         ACADEMICIANS

 QUESTION:  ACADEMICIANS IN THE COUNTRY HAVE BEEN ACCUSED BY 
 THE GOVERNMENT FOR BEING INTERESTED IN THEIR OWN AFFAIRS.   
         

     ANSWER:  Well, I can't answer for other people. I was at 

 the Kumasi Seminar to contribute. Whenever the Asantehene 

 needs my services I come to Kumasi and I am the Chairman of 

 my Rural Bank.

       The only thing academicians can do is to instil 

 knowledge in people sometimes through the newspapers. But if 

 you have a kind of a newspaper that will not publish any 

 other thing than what pleases the government, what do you 

 expect the academicians to do?       

       The last time this question was raised I told the 

 government representative that the academician could be 

 useful to the extent that the government wanted to use him.

      The academician by nature is a modest man. He cannot go 

 about proclaiming his knowledge but if you invite him he 

 will come.

    
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