Bagbin: Ghana Had Founding Fathers

As the debate on whether or not the decision to honour Ghana’s first President as ‘Founder’ of Ghana should be expanded to acknowledge the other Founding Fathers, the words of Majority Leader, Alban Bagbin clearly support the collective recognition approach.

Addressing the issue of who did what in Ghana’s march towards March 6, 1957, Mr Bagbin called for the recognition of the leadership role played by men such as Joseph Boakye Danquah.

“It is true,” he told Parliament, “that Dr J B Danquah was the spirit behind the struggle to the attainment of independence. He is really one of the architects of the struggle for our independence. He was the talent, he was the thought, he was the moving spirit behind the whole scene and he contributed tremendously to the achievement of independence in 1957.”

Stressing on the collective, Mr Babgin said in Parliament on February 28, 2007, that “I think together, led by some individuals including Dr J B Danquah, our grandfathers did well by achieving independence for us.” He warned, “We should not allow emotions to becloud the gallant efforts of all our founding members.”

Mr Bagbin received support from other NDC MPs, including George Kuntu-Blankson who noted, “It will interest the House to know that history is made by people but it is not a single individual that makes history.”

The Mfantsiman East MP stressed that the foundation of Ghana was a “collective effort.”

He warned against, what he called, the “singling out” of an individual’s efforts: “We have reached a stage in this country where there is the need for us to talk about the achievements of the collective --- so that our young generation also could learn something out of this.”

Lee Ocran, then MP for Jomoro (the seat is now held by Nkrumah’s daughter, Samia), acknowledged the work of the First Vice President of the United Gold Coast Convention, R S Blay, (the late father of President Kufuor’s Special Advisor at the Castle, Mrs Mary Chinery-Hesse and an ancestor of Freddy Blay), former Deputy Speaker.

Mr Ocran said our founding fath ers included “ordinary men” like the striking railway workers of Sekondi-Tarkoradi. Warning against the distortion of history, Mr Ocran added, “We should acknowledge the roles played by various people. Ako-Adjei played his part. Without Ako-Adjei, Kwame Nkrumah would not have come to the Gold Coast. And so were others.”

The decision by President John Mills to make Kwame Nkrumah’s birthday, 21 September, a Founder’s Day, marked by a public holiday, has received mixed reactions, with the Nkrumaists hailing it and the Danquah-Busiasts calling instead for recognition of the collective nationalist front, symbolised by the formation of the United Gold Coast Convention on August 4, 1947. Speaking to The Statesman, former MP for Abuakwa North, J B Danquah Adu, a descendant of Dr Danquah, carried the shared sentiment of the Danquah-Busiasts, by saying, President Mills is free to honour Nkrumah’s exceptional contribution to African and, even, Ghanaian politics with as many holidays as the President likes. “But what he is not free to do and can never be acceptable is to call any such day ‘Founder’s Day’. Ghana, as an independent state, has many fathers and to give that honour to Nkrumah alone would do great injustice to our history, the people who made that history and to the hallowed idea of patriotism for now and generations to come.”

According Mr Danquah Adu, who made the statement in the House two years ago that led to Mr Bagbin’s response, though the breakaway of Nkrumah to form the CPP in 1949 broke the anti-colonialism front, the country had already been brought “to the threshold of full self-government” as a result of the Watson Commission (1948) and the subsequent Coussey Committee Constitutional Report (1949), which paved the way for the 1951 elections.

He quotes a statement of Dr Danquah made in January 1960: “When independence was achieved the CPP has not been formed. The inauguration of independence took place when CPP was in power, but the priest who baptises a child is not by any chance the child’s parents.”

In 1948, the Watson Commission, set up after the February 28 massacre and riots, recommended that the people of Ghana were fit to achieve independence within ten years.

Nkrumah ceremonially declared Ghana independent in 1957, nearly a decade after Paa Grant and others of the UGCC drew up the plan for Ghana’s liberation, namely, “to ensure that in the shortest possible time,… the control and direction of the Government of the country shall pass into the hands of the people,…” and 8 years after Nkrumah screamed “Independence Now!”