Assessment: Good
Trend: ^
Capital: Accra
Type of Government: Constitutional Democracy
Head of Government: President John Agyekum Kufuor (since 7 January 2001)
Foreign Minister: Hackman Owusu-Agyeman
Population: 19,894,014
Human Development Index Ranking 2002: 129
A key factor influencing Ghana’s record is the fact that former President Jerry Rawlings began his 19-year period of leadership (1981-2000) as a military ruler who led a coup d’etat against an elected government. Therefore, he was less inclined to condemn other military dictatorships or military coups outright. His comments and speeches often contained mixed messages about the value of democracy, and he regularly showed sympathy for regimes perceived to be under siege from Western pressure. However, his personal experience made him a good candidate to negotiate with other coup-makers and rebels, which helped bring about agreements for democratic reforms in neighboring countries like Liberia and Sierra Leone.
More recently, President Kufour has had a stronger platform from which to support democracy around the world. He belongs to a political party that has a long tradition of espousing the ideals of constitutionality, and he won power in 2000 through elections that were universally acclaimed as being free and fair. Ghana is now viewed as a model democratic transition, and President Kufour is seen as a keen advocate of democracy on the continent. President Kufour was one of the few African leaders to openly condemn the manipulation of the recent elections in Zimbabwe. However, he has, in several instances, chosen domestic strategic interests over the promotion of democracy abroad. In his short time as president, he has fostered close cooperation with authoritarian leaders in the sub-region including Burkina Faso’s Blaise Campoare and Togo’s Nyasinbge Eyadema. Nevertheless the trend shows that Ghana has steadily improved its support for democracy abroad since Kufour took over from Jerry Rawlings two years ago.
In the early 1980s, for instance, Ghana agreed to embark on IMF / World Bank sponsored program of economic and political liberalization in order to attract development aid and foreign investment. It has also maintained good relations with Nigeria (from whom Ghana receives crude oil at concessionary prices) and Cote d’Ivoire (which provides electrical energy supplements when needed) irrespective of the type of leadership governing those states. Ghana is cognizant of its weak capacity for unilateral action in the international arena and hence augments its power by developing close ties (usually at the presidential level) with more powerful states. Towards this goal, President Rawlings traveled extensively to several Western capitals and hosted visits by President Clinton, Queen Elizabeth II and many other dignitaries. Since President Kufour came to power in 2001 he has also enjoyed a special relationship with the West.
Ghana’s limited capacity for unilateral action also has led it to pursue many foreign policy activities through multilateral channels such as the United Nations, the African Union (AU), and the Economic Community for West African States (ECOWAS). Membership in these organizations provide Ghana with a platform for protecting some of its interests as well as to establish itself as a leader on several issues of concern to the African continent. For example, through the UN and ECOWAS, Ghana has been able to engage in numerous peacekeeping missions, which earns it international respect as a partner for global stability and a moral leader in African affairs. But Ghana’s involvement in international peacekeeping functions is sometimes also driven more by a desire to raise funds for its military than peace and security concerns. Such pragmatism allows Ghana to influence events in neighboring African countries sometimes to an extent that belies her small size and resources.
Ghana’s other foreign relations “assets” include its status as a “role model” and the prominent role several Ghanaian nationals play in the international system. Ghana’s “role model” status arises out of the country’s position as the first African state south of the Sahara to gain independence from colonial rule and the dynamic leadership of its first president, Kwame Nkrumah, in the Pan-Africanist movement. The decision to implement World Bank sponsored economic reform programs two decades ago and recent democratic reforms have also reinforced the “role model” image and somewhat established Ghana as a leader of the movement for political change and rejuvenation of the African continent. The recent electoral victory of the opposition National Patriotic Party (NPP) and former President Jerry Rawlings’ decision to peacefully leave office after his constitutionally prescribed term limit, for instance, were seen as symbolic lessons for other African leaders.
The leadership positions occupied by Ghanaian nationals in various multilateral institutions also enhance the country’s profile in the international system. The current heads of the UN (Kofi Annan), ECOWAS (Ibn Chambas) and the Economic Commission for Africa (K.Y. Amoako) are Ghanaians. The country takes credit for the works of these and others nationals in the field of international diplomacy and often supports their work by launching mediation sessions to bring peace to war-torn countries such as Liberia, Sierra Leone, and the Cote d’Ivoire and also by hosting conferences that enhance the prospects for democracy and development in Africa.
In the case of the April 1999 coup in Niger, for instance, the Ghanaian government did not strongly condemn the overthrow of the democratically-elected government of Ibrahim Bare Mainassara. This was partly because Jerry Rawlings (himself a three-time coup maker whose recent stint in office began with the overthrow of democratically-elected government of President Hilla Limann) , was not in a strong moral position to condemn the overthrow of democratically-elected regimes elsewhere. Another reason for the poor response to the Niger coup is the fact that Ghana has neither strategic interests in nor special ties to the country. Hence Jerry Rawlings did not invest any significant resources into cultivating a friendship with its leadership as he did with Presidents Konan Bedie of neighboring Cote d’Ivoire and Sani Abacha of Nigeria (Ghana’s principal ally in West Africa).
Personal friendships were an important aspect of foreign relations under Rawlings. In the case of the Cote d’Ivoire coup (1999) for instance, ousted President Bedie, a personal friend of Mr. Rawlings, paid a visit to Ghana to enlist the support for his return to power.
The Rawlings government condemned the coup and declared that the Ivorian junta would not enjoy any support from Ghana. The government, however, refrained from applying any unilateral measures to force the coup leader, General Robert Guei, out of office and instead limited its involvement to an ECOWAS mediation plan that eventually persuaded General Guei to hold elections in October 2000. Rawlings supported the return of Bedie (who was the guest of honor at Ghana’s 40th independence anniversary in 1997) in spite of the fact that he was widely believed to have rigged the October 1995 elections that confirmed him in power. Since becoming President, Kufour has also fostered a close relationship with neighboring leaders such as Bedie’s successor, Laurent Gbagbo. The Kufour regime therefore responded to the recent coup attempt against Mr. Gbagbo (September 2002) with an immediate and strong condemnation of the coup plotters. Ghana has since hosted an ECOWAS summit on the reconciliation process in Cote d’Ivoire and has promised to send troops as part of any ECOWAS peacekeeping presence.
In the Cote d’Ivoire case, President Bedie was perceived by several observers to have manipulated the elections that confirmed him as President in 1995. The Ghana government’s silence may have been due to the personal friendship between Mr. Bedie and Mr. Rawlings as well as Ghana’s strategic and economic relationship with Cote d’Ivoire.
In a clear departure from Rawlings, John Kufour’s administration has openly condemned attempts by foreign governments to manipulate electoral processes since it came to power in 2001. The government has also dispatched observers to join election-monitoring missions in several countries. In Zimbabwe’s March 2002 elections, for instance, Ghana strongly defended the principle of free and fair elections and dispatched official election monitors to the country. The monitors found the elections not to be transparent and noted the absence of an independent Electoral Commission in Zimbabwe. President Kufour made clear his disapproval of Mr. Mugabe’s attempts to hold on to power through the manipulation of the vote. He fully backed Zimbabwe's suspension from the Commonwealth, and decried treason charges leveled against the main opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
Ghana under Kufour has also been at the forefront of the New Partnership for African Development (Nepad) and a strong advocate for the peer review mechanism that emphasizes good governance as criteria for membership.
Jerry Rawlings’ populism drew him to support most left-wing regimes when he ruled Ghana as a dictator from 1981 to 1992. His ties with entrenched dictators like Muammar Quadafi and Fidel Castro became weaker after he transformed himself into a civilian President. However, strong ties with “local” dictators such as Sanni Abacha of Nigeria persisted and shaped Ghana’s policies. Rawlings became a personal apologist for the Abacha regime and tried to persuade the Commonwealth against suspending Nigeria following Mr. Abacha’s execution of the six Ogoni nationalists in 1995.
In 1996, Mr. Abacha was invited as the guest of honor at Mr. Rawlings' second inauguration. It was later alleged in The Post Express, a Nigerian newspaper, that Rawlings had accepted a fee of $5 millions from Abacha in 1996 to help rehabilitate his international reputation. When Rawlings met with the US Special Representative on Liberia, he called for the recognition of Nigeria's leading role in resolving the Liberian conflict. "It is therefore fair that we give Nigeria due credit," he said.
Since becoming president, Kufour has also encouraged links with entrenched dictators like Eyadema of Togo. To the surprise of many observers, one of his first trips abroad after coming to power was to Togo. This may have been due to the financial help and others forms of assistance that Eyadema, a long-time Rawlings adversary, is rumored to have given to Kufour’s party in the run up to the December 2000 elections.
President Kufour appears committed also to maintaining some level of cooperation with Cuba’s Fidel Castro, a staunch friend and role model for Rawlings. Once again, socio-economic interests may be the underlying factor. Cuban doctors have been an important presence in Ghana’s health services since the early 1980s. In July 2002, Ghana’s Foreign Minister Hackman Owusu-Agyemang visited Cuba to successfully negotiate an increase in the number of Cuban doctors working in Ghana. Cuba also agreed to send medical professors to Ghana’s University of Development Studies at Tamale.
Clearly, when strategic interests are at stake, Ghana’s leaders have chosen cooperation and friendship with entrenched dictators over criticism
Assessment: Good
Trend: ^
Capital: Accra
Type of Government: Constitutional Democracy
Head of Government: President John Agyekum Kufuor (since 7 January 2001)
Foreign Minister: Hackman Owusu-Agyeman
Population: 19,894,014
Human Development Index Ranking 2002: 129
A key factor influencing Ghana’s record is the fact that former President Jerry Rawlings began his 19-year period of leadership (1981-2000) as a military ruler who led a coup d’etat against an elected government. Therefore, he was less inclined to condemn other military dictatorships or military coups outright. His comments and speeches often contained mixed messages about the value of democracy, and he regularly showed sympathy for regimes perceived to be under siege from Western pressure. However, his personal experience made him a good candidate to negotiate with other coup-makers and rebels, which helped bring about agreements for democratic reforms in neighboring countries like Liberia and Sierra Leone.
More recently, President Kufour has had a stronger platform from which to support democracy around the world. He belongs to a political party that has a long tradition of espousing the ideals of constitutionality, and he won power in 2000 through elections that were universally acclaimed as being free and fair. Ghana is now viewed as a model democratic transition, and President Kufour is seen as a keen advocate of democracy on the continent. President Kufour was one of the few African leaders to openly condemn the manipulation of the recent elections in Zimbabwe. However, he has, in several instances, chosen domestic strategic interests over the promotion of democracy abroad. In his short time as president, he has fostered close cooperation with authoritarian leaders in the sub-region including Burkina Faso’s Blaise Campoare and Togo’s Nyasinbge Eyadema. Nevertheless the trend shows that Ghana has steadily improved its support for democracy abroad since Kufour took over from Jerry Rawlings two years ago.
In the early 1980s, for instance, Ghana agreed to embark on IMF / World Bank sponsored program of economic and political liberalization in order to attract development aid and foreign investment. It has also maintained good relations with Nigeria (from whom Ghana receives crude oil at concessionary prices) and Cote d’Ivoire (which provides electrical energy supplements when needed) irrespective of the type of leadership governing those states. Ghana is cognizant of its weak capacity for unilateral action in the international arena and hence augments its power by developing close ties (usually at the presidential level) with more powerful states. Towards this goal, President Rawlings traveled extensively to several Western capitals and hosted visits by President Clinton, Queen Elizabeth II and many other dignitaries. Since President Kufour came to power in 2001 he has also enjoyed a special relationship with the West.
Ghana’s limited capacity for unilateral action also has led it to pursue many foreign policy activities through multilateral channels such as the United Nations, the African Union (AU), and the Economic Community for West African States (ECOWAS). Membership in these organizations provide Ghana with a platform for protecting some of its interests as well as to establish itself as a leader on several issues of concern to the African continent. For example, through the UN and ECOWAS, Ghana has been able to engage in numerous peacekeeping missions, which earns it international respect as a partner for global stability and a moral leader in African affairs. But Ghana’s involvement in international peacekeeping functions is sometimes also driven more by a desire to raise funds for its military than peace and security concerns. Such pragmatism allows Ghana to influence events in neighboring African countries sometimes to an extent that belies her small size and resources.
Ghana’s other foreign relations “assets” include its status as a “role model” and the prominent role several Ghanaian nationals play in the international system. Ghana’s “role model” status arises out of the country’s position as the first African state south of the Sahara to gain independence from colonial rule and the dynamic leadership of its first president, Kwame Nkrumah, in the Pan-Africanist movement. The decision to implement World Bank sponsored economic reform programs two decades ago and recent democratic reforms have also reinforced the “role model” image and somewhat established Ghana as a leader of the movement for political change and rejuvenation of the African continent. The recent electoral victory of the opposition National Patriotic Party (NPP) and former President Jerry Rawlings’ decision to peacefully leave office after his constitutionally prescribed term limit, for instance, were seen as symbolic lessons for other African leaders.
The leadership positions occupied by Ghanaian nationals in various multilateral institutions also enhance the country’s profile in the international system. The current heads of the UN (Kofi Annan), ECOWAS (Ibn Chambas) and the Economic Commission for Africa (K.Y. Amoako) are Ghanaians. The country takes credit for the works of these and others nationals in the field of international diplomacy and often supports their work by launching mediation sessions to bring peace to war-torn countries such as Liberia, Sierra Leone, and the Cote d’Ivoire and also by hosting conferences that enhance the prospects for democracy and development in Africa.
In the case of the April 1999 coup in Niger, for instance, the Ghanaian government did not strongly condemn the overthrow of the democratically-elected government of Ibrahim Bare Mainassara. This was partly because Jerry Rawlings (himself a three-time coup maker whose recent stint in office began with the overthrow of democratically-elected government of President Hilla Limann) , was not in a strong moral position to condemn the overthrow of democratically-elected regimes elsewhere. Another reason for the poor response to the Niger coup is the fact that Ghana has neither strategic interests in nor special ties to the country. Hence Jerry Rawlings did not invest any significant resources into cultivating a friendship with its leadership as he did with Presidents Konan Bedie of neighboring Cote d’Ivoire and Sani Abacha of Nigeria (Ghana’s principal ally in West Africa).
Personal friendships were an important aspect of foreign relations under Rawlings. In the case of the Cote d’Ivoire coup (1999) for instance, ousted President Bedie, a personal friend of Mr. Rawlings, paid a visit to Ghana to enlist the support for his return to power.
The Rawlings government condemned the coup and declared that the Ivorian junta would not enjoy any support from Ghana. The government, however, refrained from applying any unilateral measures to force the coup leader, General Robert Guei, out of office and instead limited its involvement to an ECOWAS mediation plan that eventually persuaded General Guei to hold elections in October 2000. Rawlings supported the return of Bedie (who was the guest of honor at Ghana’s 40th independence anniversary in 1997) in spite of the fact that he was widely believed to have rigged the October 1995 elections that confirmed him in power. Since becoming President, Kufour has also fostered a close relationship with neighboring leaders such as Bedie’s successor, Laurent Gbagbo. The Kufour regime therefore responded to the recent coup attempt against Mr. Gbagbo (September 2002) with an immediate and strong condemnation of the coup plotters. Ghana has since hosted an ECOWAS summit on the reconciliation process in Cote d’Ivoire and has promised to send troops as part of any ECOWAS peacekeeping presence.
In the Cote d’Ivoire case, President Bedie was perceived by several observers to have manipulated the elections that confirmed him as President in 1995. The Ghana government’s silence may have been due to the personal friendship between Mr. Bedie and Mr. Rawlings as well as Ghana’s strategic and economic relationship with Cote d’Ivoire.
In a clear departure from Rawlings, John Kufour’s administration has openly condemned attempts by foreign governments to manipulate electoral processes since it came to power in 2001. The government has also dispatched observers to join election-monitoring missions in several countries. In Zimbabwe’s March 2002 elections, for instance, Ghana strongly defended the principle of free and fair elections and dispatched official election monitors to the country. The monitors found the elections not to be transparent and noted the absence of an independent Electoral Commission in Zimbabwe. President Kufour made clear his disapproval of Mr. Mugabe’s attempts to hold on to power through the manipulation of the vote. He fully backed Zimbabwe's suspension from the Commonwealth, and decried treason charges leveled against the main opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
Ghana under Kufour has also been at the forefront of the New Partnership for African Development (Nepad) and a strong advocate for the peer review mechanism that emphasizes good governance as criteria for membership.
Jerry Rawlings’ populism drew him to support most left-wing regimes when he ruled Ghana as a dictator from 1981 to 1992. His ties with entrenched dictators like Muammar Quadafi and Fidel Castro became weaker after he transformed himself into a civilian President. However, strong ties with “local” dictators such as Sanni Abacha of Nigeria persisted and shaped Ghana’s policies. Rawlings became a personal apologist for the Abacha regime and tried to persuade the Commonwealth against suspending Nigeria following Mr. Abacha’s execution of the six Ogoni nationalists in 1995.
In 1996, Mr. Abacha was invited as the guest of honor at Mr. Rawlings' second inauguration. It was later alleged in The Post Express, a Nigerian newspaper, that Rawlings had accepted a fee of $5 millions from Abacha in 1996 to help rehabilitate his international reputation. When Rawlings met with the US Special Representative on Liberia, he called for the recognition of Nigeria's leading role in resolving the Liberian conflict. "It is therefore fair that we give Nigeria due credit," he said.
Since becoming president, Kufour has also encouraged links with entrenched dictators like Eyadema of Togo. To the surprise of many observers, one of his first trips abroad after coming to power was to Togo. This may have been due to the financial help and others forms of assistance that Eyadema, a long-time Rawlings adversary, is rumored to have given to Kufour’s party in the run up to the December 2000 elections.
President Kufour appears committed also to maintaining some level of cooperation with Cuba’s Fidel Castro, a staunch friend and role model for Rawlings. Once again, socio-economic interests may be the underlying factor. Cuban doctors have been an important presence in Ghana’s health services since the early 1980s. In July 2002, Ghana’s Foreign Minister Hackman Owusu-Agyemang visited Cuba to successfully negotiate an increase in the number of Cuban doctors working in Ghana. Cuba also agreed to send medical professors to Ghana’s University of Development Studies at Tamale.
Clearly, when strategic interests are at stake, Ghana’s leaders have chosen cooperation and friendship with entrenched dictators over criticism
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