Jerry Rawlings, the darling of African liberation movements For years Jerry Rawlings was the darling of African liberation movements and of the West. Now vultures are circling the former Ghanaian president's legacy amid speculation the country's truth commission will go in for the kill.
A year-and-a-half ago Rawlings, the charismatic military-ruler-turned-civilian-president, became one of a select few African leaders to retire gracefully as his National Democratic Congress (NDC) suffered defeat in democratic elections. Since then old scandals -- and some new -- have come back to haunt him.
Says Kweku Baako, editor of the muckraking Crusading Guide: "This is poetic justice for Rawlings. The yardstick that he used to test others is what is being used to examine him; to see if he lived according to the principles he espoused."
Journalists -- some of whom, like Baako, were jailed during the Rawlings era -- have been having a field day exposing the alleged excesses of the former president and former first lady Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings.
Stories since last year have included allegations of a Swiss bank account, contract kickbacks and the irregular privatisation of a state company to party elements. Earlier claims have included that Rawlings's regime was deeply implicated in the international drug trade after a top Ghana diplomat-cum-spy was arrested in Switzerland in 1996 for alleged cocaine trafficking.
Rawlings's NDC has countered that the flurry of exposes is part of a campaign of "witch-hunting, harassment and undercover assault" by the new President, John Kufuor, and his National Patriotic Party government.
Some of the allegations of financial impropriety are under investigation by authorities. There are constitutional provisions, however, that limit the actions that can be brought against Rawlings and may shield him to an extent.
Perhaps a bigger threat to Rawlings's political legacy stems from the kind of dirt that may surface during investigations and hearings of the National Reconciliation Commission.
The Ghanaian commission earlier this month started collecting petitions from those who suffered human rights abuse during the six military regimes that ruled Ghana for 22 years after the 1966 coup that deposed the nation's founding president, Dr Kwame Nkrumah. The commission, which will seek to compensate victims, will likely start public hearings in a month or two.
Based on the victim submissions received so far, says Baako, much of the commission's focus will be on Rawlings's two military regimes: one short-lived in 1979, and his "second coming" that lasted from the last day of 1981 to 1992. Between 1992 and January 2001 Rawlings headed two civilian governments after he won elections that were, however, not universally accepted as free and fair.
The Ghana Bar Association has reportedly estimated 200 "disappearances" during Rawlings's military rule. And among the more controversial executions, judicial and extra- judicial, that may come back to haunt Rawlings are those of three military rulers who were his predecessors and, separately from that, three judges and a retired military officer.
The three military rulers were hurriedly tried on corruption and treason charges after Rawlings's first coup in 1979. Critics maintain their crimes -- including taking power by force -- were no greater than those of Rawlings himself.
The three judges and a retired military officer, supposedly enemies of Rawlings's first regime, were abducted in 1982 after Rawlings's second coup. Their bullet-ridden, burnt bodies were discovered at a military range.
Rawlings condemned the killings and allowed Amartey Kwei, a member of his ruling Provisional National Defence Council, and a number of soldiers to be tried, convicted and executed.
During the trial Kwei claimed -- although his testimony was rejected by the tribunal -- that Rawlings's security chief ordered the killings. Equally damaging was uncontested testimony that the military jeep used to abduct the victims had been parked at the house of Rawlings's wife immediately before the operation. The reconciliation commission is likely to revisit the issue.
Should Rawlings's legacy be further tainted by the reconciliation commission proceedings, some may see it as little more than another scene in a drama of perpetual reinvention by a self-made man.
Not yet 32 when he led his first government, Rawlings was a charismatic populist who endeared himself with words such as: "I am not an expert in economics and I am not an expert in law, but I am an expert in working on an empty stomach."
Although no ideologue, he started out a leftist champion of the poor. A few years down the line, Rawlings became a darling of the West as he pursued the Bretton-Woods-style economic reform.
But Rawlings pleased more than one audience. In security affairs he remained close to Eastern Bloc countries. And, following in the footsteps of Nkrumah, his continued support for African liberation movements endeared him to the continent.
