Opinions of Saturday, 14 May 2005
Columnist: Okoampa-Ahoofe, Kwame
The Enduring Legacy Of Dr. J. B. Danquah ? Part 10
Some self-proclaimed Nkrumah fanatics ? and here we hasten to distinguish this group from genuine Nkruma(h)ists ? recently E-mailed this writer expressing insufferable scorn over Dr. Danquah?s honorific epithet of ?Doyen of Gold Coast and Ghanaian Politics.? And here, also, we make a critical distinction between these fanatics and genuine Nkrumahists, lest we risk having our discourse devolve into a proverbial exercise in futility. Needless to say, a ?fanatic? is one whose actions and thoughts are almost wholly underscored by emotion rather than reason or even a deft balance between these two fundamental elements of human nature. As a result, the trend of their logic tends to be largely predicated upon slogans and fleeting sound-bite ? or snappy ? remarks invariably and woefully lacking in historical and epistemological substance. On this score, the fanatic may be aptly envisaged to be pathologically afflicted with temperamental preliteracy. And it is not that the fanatic is fundamentally, cognitively incapacitated or instructionally challenged, it is simply that they have not acculturated themselves to the indisputably rewarding habit of knowledge acquisition.
The ?genuine Nkrumahist,? on the other hand, is an informed disciple of the ideology of the first premier of post-colonial Ghana. He or she is intellectually and emotionally mature enough to both casually and critically accept the ineluctable fallibility of their patriarch. It is, indeed, this breed of Nkrumahist that appears to be sorely lacking in most discursive fare that passes for ideological Nkrumahism. It is also quite interesting, however, that these fanatics routinely appropriate the traditional monarchical honorific ? or appellation ? of ?Osagyefo? in describing their hero without any qualms whatsoever. It does not even appear to them just how a Marxist ideologue who insuperably detested Ghanaian chieftaincy ended up brazenly converting himself into such. And if you happen to have read Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe?s seminal classic Things Fall Apart (1958), then perhaps such behavioral conduct may come as no anomaly or surprise to you at all. Remember the ritualistic practice of decapitating one?s enemy in war and using the latter?s skull to drink palm-wine? The curious rationale was that the vanquished owner of the skull?s powers then, through some protean and bizarre process of osmosis, inhabited the personality of the killer-warrior. Rather tragic that such purportedly spiritual empowerment did not prevent Obi Okonkwo from his ultimate fate of suicide by hanging.
And so, perhaps, we could aptly fathom that in scornfully usurping the traditional honorific of the Okyenhene ? as well as that of several other Ghanaian paramount kings ? President Nkrumah imagined himself to have also assumed some of the purportedly potent spiritual and political forces possessed by these vanquished chieftains. Another Nigerian Nobel Literature Laureate cast the preceding scenario in even far more picturesque and dramatic tenor in a play titled Kongi?s Harvest. Mr. Wole Soyinka, however, vehemently demurred when the unmistakably striking resemblance of Emperor Kongi and Dr. Nkrumah was brought to his attention. Needless to say, it was a rather suave move, for Professor Soyinka has kept his admirers and critics guessing for some three decades now.
Indeed, Dr. Danquah?s honorific of ?Doyen of Gold Coast Politics? was conferred on him, unsolicited, in 1948 by the Watson Commission which inquired into the infamous ?and dastardly shooting of [some] unarmed ex-servicemen at the Christiansborg crossroads? (The Doyen Speaks 1). Among the latter victims was the celebrated Sgt. Adjetey, a World War II veteran. The incident, which became widely dubbed as ?the Gold Coast disturbances of 1948,? largely hinged on the fast-creeping economic hardships perceived to have been squarely engendered by the British colonial government, then chaperoned by Sir Gerald Creasy. It is also interesting that in the aftermath of the preceding massacre of peacefully protesting Ghanaian demonstrators when Danquah called for the immediate withdrawal of Governor Creasy from the helm of colonial Ghanaian affairs, the Doyen also bluntly described the former as an ?unfortunate inheritor of the window-dressing administration of Sir Alan [Maxwell] Burns? (Doyen Speaks 2). It is interesting because, as amply highlighted earlier on, Sir Alan Burns was the man who almost single-handedly backed Dr. Danquah?s historic initiative to precipitate the establishment of the University of Ghana, against vehement opposition from the British Colonial Office, then headed by the Fabian autocrat Mr. Creech Jones. Indeed, nearly five years earlier, in 1943, when he wrote and published his comprehensive report on the activities of the Gold Coast Youth Conference (GCYC), Danquah made the following laudatory remark with regard to his celebrated ?Case for African Freedom?: ?Well, I, personally, cannot speak for the British Government, nor do I think the Youth Conference can answer for the Gold Coast Government. But I, personally, have an enormous faith in Sir Alan Maxwell Burns, our present Governor, and I believe that when he talks of starting this country on an industrial economy, not only for the war but [also] for the benefit of this country, he means what he says. Sir Alan Maxwell Burns, I think, is a courageous man. Any Governor of the Gold Coast who has the courage to introduce income tax with a special tax of [5 shillings? on the pound] on company profits, must be a courageous man. I believe that for as long as our present Governor is spared to remain with us, this country will see marvelous advances in industrial development? (Self-Help And Expansion 18-19).
Furthermore, Danquah highlights the exploitative capriciousness of British colonial administrative policy by grimly observing: ?But, then, you would say, this Governor will not always be with us. He may have to go to Nigeria, as he has done before, and in his absence, permanent or temporary, anything can happen. There is no guarantee of continuity in Colonial Government policy. Sir Arnold Hudson was telling the Youth Conference to wait till after the war before any inquiry is made into the possibilities of industrial production. Sir Alan Maxwell Burns did not wait for the Youth Conference to ask him, and we all know that he has already made a start on it. There is not a town our Governor visits, but he must pay a visit to a factory where something or other is being manufactured, whether by Syrians, Europeans or Africans. That is a good sign? (Self-Help And Expansion 19).
And so, needless to say, what happened between 1943 or ?44, when Dr. Danquah paid such glowing tribute to Governor Alan Burns, and March 1948, when the Doyen dismissively summed up the former?s tenure as one that had largely constituted an administrative ?window-dressing??
If we were less circumspect, we could be facilely tempted to agree with then-Mr. Kwame Nkrumah that, perhaps, Sir Alan Burns? handling of the infamous Kyebi Ritual Murder, or the Akyea-Mensah saga, had something to do with such dramatic cognitive twist or turnaround. But there is no concrete evidence pointing to such possibility. And to be certain, while the publication date for Danquah?s review of the activities of the Gold Coast Youth Conference is not definitive, for the period covered appears to have been the entire year of 1943, during which period the Osagyefo Nana Sir Ofori-Atta I abruptly took ill and died, most likely, Danquah?s report was published during the early months of 1944, about the very period which witnessed the brutal gagging and decapitation of Chief Akyea-Mensah, of Akyem-Apedwa. And what is more, as noted in the preceding segment of this series, the Doyen himself had reportedly written a letter, dated September 27, 1944, observing to the late King?s successor and the latter?s nephew, Nana Ofori-Atta II, that strong evidence indicated that the Chief of Apedwa had, indeed, been brutally murdered by some members of the Kyebi royal family (see Rathbone?s Murder And Politics In Colonial Ghana).
Furthermore, President Nkrumah?s contention, to Richard Rathbone, that it was the Akyea-Mensah case which politically galvanized Danquah and his ilk, who had hitherto been purportedly lethargic, does not appear to bear ? or square ? up with the evidence. To be certain, the fact that by 1947 and even 1949, when Nkrumah broke with the executive members of Danquah?s United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC), the former UGCC general secretary was bitterly complaining about the unpardonably gradualistic and outright Fabian tendencies of the top-hierarchy of the original Convention party, sharply contradicts Nkrumah?s own account, as reported by Richard Rathbone (see Murder And Politics In Colonial Ghana). Neither is there any available credible evidence adumbrating the widely propagated allegation that the Akyea-Mensah murder might, indeed, have impeded Ghana?s race towards its auspicious assumption of sovereignty from British colonial rule.
What, indeed, is certain is the fact that the so-called Gold Coast disturbances of 1948 appear to have almost singularly catalyzed Ghana?s vehement clamor for the re-assertion of her sovereignty. Indeed, in the wake of the Doyen?s appearance before the Watson Commission, charged with investigating the causes of the disturbances, the foremost Gold Coast constitutional lawyer was also invited by Mr. Aitken-Watson, the commission?s chairman, to supply the colonial government with ?a draft constitution for the Gold Coast? (Doyen Speaks 6). Danquah, the astute and organic intellectual would single-handedly draft a constitution one of whose highlights observed poignantly as follows: ?(4) By agreement with the French in which the good offices of the United Kingdom Government will be sought in consideration for military and air bases, those parts of French Togoland and French Ivory Coast which belong ethnologically to the tribes of Ashanti, Nzima, Aowin and Eweland, will become part of Ghanaland? (Doyen Speaks 7). Here again, Danquah appears to have been vindicated, particularly when the well-meaning and keen observer reviews recent political events in the two Francophone enclaves of Cote d?Ivoire and Togo. But, perhaps, the preceding is more significant in view of the fact that it eloquently and authoritatively debunks lingering mythology, propagated largely by some who claim Nkrumahist suasion, that Danquah?s supposed ideological parochialism prompted the Doyen to rule out the demarcation of an independent Ghana which included much of the present Volta Region of the country. To the contrary, Danquah?s draft constitution actually sought the organic incorporation of a land area remarkably larger than the current geopolitical area of Ghana. Needless to say, such scandalous accusation has sought to portray Danquah as an ethnic chauvinist (or tribalist), where the more exuberant and idealistic Kwame Nkrumah is envisaged as a pan-Africanist. Likewise, where the latter brazenly sought to cannibalize the old pre-colonial institutions of governance, under the hostile guise of Marxist materialism, the Doyen sought a proactive political intermarriage: ?The main characteristic of the constitution will be to blend the old with the new, chieftaincy with democracy, the inherited culture with [the] progressive[ly] modern? (Doyen Speaks 7).
Indeed, the 1951 constitution, which ushered Nkrumah into the reins of governance, appears to have been largely based on Danquah?s draft constitution of 1948. If the preceding observation has validity, then it may also be apt to conclude that while, indeed, Dr. Nkrumah reserves exclusive credit for being modern Ghana?s Founding Premier, Dr. Danquah is indisputably the Father of Modern Ghana. To be certain, the current decentralized administrative machinery being operated under the aegis of the so-called Fourth Republic of Ghana, owes much more to Dr. Danquah?s initiative and genius than those of any other pioneering Ghanaian leader or statesman. It is also interesting to observe that even as early as 1949, a full eight years before the country?s formal re-assertion of sovereignty, Dr. Nkrumah was already exhibiting creeping signs of a dictator, for by Christmas Day, 1949, when Danquah wrote to admonish the former against his threatened launching of a ?Positive Action? campaign, the future first prime minister of Ghana had already assumed the eerie title of ?Life Chairman? of his Convention People?s Party (CPP) ? (Doyen Speaks 11).
Danquah also pays eloquent tribute to the great Ghanaian, pioneering surveyor who facilitated the demarcation of the geopolitical boundaries of Modern Ghana, Mr. George Ekem Ferguson: ?I conceive that the first act of the constitution-making body [i.e. the Constituent Assembly] will be to make a clean break away from the memories of the old days of exploitation and imperialism, and the colonial adjective Gold Coast will give way to the substantive name of the people of the country, Ghana and Ghanaland. The Colony will become South Ghana, Ashanti will remain Ashanti, and the Northern Territories, which were made part of the Gold Coast by the enterprise of George Ekem Ferguson of Anomabu, will become either Fergusonia or North Ghana? (Doyen Speaks 7). But one only begins to fully appreciate the ideological genius of the putative Doyen of Gold Coast and Ghanaian politics, when one recognizes the fact that it was not until as recently as 1951 that the three colonial entities of the country were incorporated into a single organic unit. So in reality, Danquah only lived in Ghana, as we have come to know it, for less than 20-percent of his life. My maternal grandfather, the Reverend T. H. Sintim, who was only two months younger than Dr. Danquah, and a year the latter?s junior at the Akyem-Begoro Presbyterian Middle Boys? Boarding School, lived exactly one-third (or a third) of his life in post-colonial Ghana. On the preceding score, our country could be aptly seen to have experienced the kind of checkered and traumatic existence which has witnessed the total collapse of similarly placed post-colonial Third-World countries. And so we cannot be all diffident and disillusioned about the future. For as the great Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe once observed: ?It is yet morning on creation?s day.?
Even so, Danquah insists that perhaps his arch-nemesis did more than could ever be imagined to impede the onward march towards Ghana?s re-assertion of her sovereignty in the twentieth century: ?The independence of our land! We are preparing for it today. But it has been delayed too long. Since 1951 when we could have had it without ?Positive Action,? without ?Personal negotiations,? without ?The Togoland Problem,? the quest has been so [long] delayed that we are now struggling for an ?Agreed Constitution? in a violent general election? (?Message? in Doyen Speaks). And it is to the preceding issue of ?Positive Action? that we return in our next segment.
Views expressed by the author(s) do not necessarily reflect those of GhanaHomePage.
