Emancipation day celebration, any improved benefit to the natives?

Based on hindsight, Emancipation was originally celebrated in the Caribbean to commemorate the final abolition of Chatel Slavery in the British colonies on 1st August 1834. Ghana, therefore, became the first African nation to be part of the celebration in 1998 to re-affirm its status as the Gateway to the African Homeland of Diasporans.

The Day, has, as a result, metamorphosed into an annual ritualistic event in Ghana that is well preserved and acknowledged by the people of African descent in the Diaspora, universally.

Historically, Ghana’s assertion as the key corridor to the Native land of our brothers and sisters in the Diaspora cannot be in disputation, as at the time, there’s a well-documented fact that, this country served as the major exit point for human logistics that were transported to the West Indies and the Americas in the period that the infamous trade took place.

However, the events of this human atrocity cannot be grossed over, without recognizing its emanating negative impact imposed on Assins holistically, but more specifically, the ancient town of Assin Manso, which is the capital of Assin Apimanim traditional council. There is no doubt that the natives of Assin irrefutably suffered privation and deprivation in many forms, leaving in its trail a form of ‘vicious cycle of poverty’ encountered by the natives, that, up till today, continues to militate against the successes of the natives.

Nonetheless, this year’s emancipation day celebration is expected to usher in new perspectives, new paradigms, new perceptions, new frontiers, and new vision, if the much-heralded annual event is to live up to its mandate; mainly to bring hope to the yearning society, improve the tourism potential of the all-inclusive Assin enclave, through financial and physical support, to improve upon the infrastructural development of the area from our brothers and sisters of the Diaspora and central government as well.

Be it as it may, the positive effect of this celebration on the dwellers is projected to anchor on a plethora of dynamics. Here, there is an urgent need for the ancient town of Manso to foster bilateral cooperation through sister-city relationships that could enhance development transformation through the promotion of local businesses and tourism in its entirety, to improve the way of living of the people.

Furthermore, the erection of gigantic statues at both ends of the main road visibly depicting an exhausted and scruffy slave in long secured chains with tears running down both cheeks, having lighting systems affixed to improve illumination, would definitely add to the recollection, memory, splendor, and color to all classification of visitors.

Indeed, the strategic location of Assin Manso SHS could be re-configured to house a University department or faculty that would offer advanced pedagogical programs e.g Slavery and Emancipation studies to further probe the historical antecedent of this barbaric atrocity that bedeviled the Assins and for that matter the entire country centuries ago.

Now, much as the above interventions have been highlighted, the natives are of the utmost conviction that the institution of annual local and foreign academic scholarships to support the youth of the Assin enclave could ‘turn the scales’ for positive outcomes.

In all these submissions, we are calling on the Members of Parliament (MP’s) of the three Assin constituencies and the DCE’s to lead the crusade to guarantee that the above propositions are fully implemented to the letter.