Mills’ Finest Policy: No Bloody Force in the Ivory Coast

*By Akadu Ntiriwa Mensema, Ph. D.

“President John Evans Atta Mills has confirmed his government is unable to

contribute troops to any ECOWAS mission to oust incumbent president of the Ivory

Coast, Laurent Gbagbo, should the regional body make do with its threat”

(Ghanaweb, January 7, 2011).

Hmm! The West, Africa’s siblings

Call theirs CIVIL WARS

The American Civil War

They call Africa’s TRIBAL WARS

The West call theirs REVOLUTIONS

The French Revolution

They call Africa’s RIOTS

The 1948 Riots; the Aba Riots

Ghana should not shed blood

Let the historical moment speak

Not a drop of blood

No Africanization of barbarism

The enduring media images

Of African savages

Of traumatic histories

The enduring depreciations

Cherished imperial narratives

Discredited anthropologies

Packaged by our delirious foes

Ghana should not shed blood

Not a drop of blood

Not for French neo/colonialism

Not for Western hegemony

Not for Western elated appetite

For Ivory Coast’s cocoa

Oil, timber, coffee, palm oil

Not for the UN, ECOWAS

Ah! Atta called Konongo Kaya

He who has outsmarted JJ

JJ the demonizing monk

Ah Atta the Castle Snail

President Atta Mills

Your moment of excellence

Your endearing rainfall

Eclipses your long drought

Heralding thriving petals

Of new blooming ideas

Of pan-Africanism

Of ecstatic Nkrumahism

Of Africanizing self

Of self-conscientization

Epochal political rainfall

Fertilizing a new season

Seasons of progress

Of regenerating new seeds

That we must not, not again

We won’t do their bidding

The biddings of the imperialists

Multinational companies

The French, UNO, USA

President Mills

Let your critics eat their crow

Crushing their tongues

Crushed in bitter truths

Ghana should not shed blood

Not for the French

Not for French colonialism

Not for French Connection

Not for American hegemony

Not for Western interests

Imperialist interests

Pivoted by the UN

Chaired by Ban Ki-Moon

The UN boss & South Korean

Tell him to invade North Korea

The worst trouble-spot

Ask Asian countries to do so

Ask the UN to occupy North Korea

The agitated imperialists

Multinational corporations

The French Connection

Their insatiable colonial appetite

Salivating for cocoa

For oil, timber

Africans can achieve it all

Stability on our own

The rule of law

Cultivated laws

Laws of habit

Call it democracy

Ghana is doing it

Benin is doing

Coming to our own

Recount the vote

America has done it

2000 Bush & Al Gore

So Ivorians can recount votes

That’s a democratic tradition

Governments evolve

Governments are not imposed

Ghana must protect Ivorians

Must wean Ivorian bloodshed

Let them recount the votes

That is THE Democracy

Espoused by the West

Bloodshed is Demo-Crazy

Gun-toting Demo-Crazy

Of Africans’ badge of honor

Of immemorial bloodsheds

*Akadu N. Mensema, Ph. D., is a nationalist Denkyira beauty. She is a trained

oral historian cum sociologist and Professor in the USA. She lives in

Pennsylvania with her great mentor and teaches Africa-area studies at a college

in Maryland. In her pastime, she writes what critics have called “populist

hyperbolic, satirical” poetry. She can be reached at akadumensema@yahoo.com