I was particularly thrilled by the mere thought of going to Ghana on vacation from the end of May through the first few days of August this year. My excitement stemmed from the fact that I had not been to that beautiful country in the twelve years prior to this planned visit. Friends and family members who had visited Ghana within the last decade always talked about mini sky scrapers, overhead by-passes and private homes springing up like mushrooms all over the country. They also mentioned the rampant water shortages and, of course, the frequent power outages commonly referred to as “dumsor, dumsor”. The last two pieces of information notwithstanding, I still could not wait to visit the beloved country.
In my ecstasy I forgot for a while that my citizenship status had changed and that I needed a visa to go to Ghana. When eventually someone was kind enough to remind me about the visa acquisition it felt like the wind had been taken out of my sail since the proposed departure date was just days away and I could not be sure the visa application could be processed and approved before then. I went ahead, anyway, and submitted the application form and the appropriate fees to the consular office in New York and was granted ninety (90) days stay in Ghana; thanks to the dedication and hard work of the staff of that office. .
I set off by an American Airline flight from Columbus, Ohio to New York on May 30th and connected a British Airways flight to Accra via London arriving at the Kotoka International Airport at approximately 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, May 31, 2014.
While on the London-Accra bound flight all passengers were given an immigration form to fill out indicating, among other things, how long they were going to stay in Ghana. On arrival in Accra we had to form long and winding queues in order to submit the completed forms and passports to immigration officers waiting in cubicles at the Airport. Nothing could be more frustrating than to stand in line while what appears to be ‘agents’ of the immigration officers (who, by all indications, are officers themselves) go to the back of the line and pick up other new arrivals (unclear if these new arrivals were friends or paymasters) to the front of the line while the rest of us just stood by and looked on. Eventually my turn came and I submitted my documents. Although I had indicated on the form that I was going to stay a little over seventy (70) days, which was within the ninety-day window granted by the Consular office in New York and for which I had paid good money, the immigration officer who served me stamped my passport and wrote 60 days, almost illegibly in blue ink on indigo background within the stamped portion of the passport.
From the immigration officer’s cube I proceeded to the Baggage Claim area. This was a fairly wide enclosed area with minimal or no air-conditioning. I spent over two hours here in the extreme heat trying to locate my luggage on a conveyor which kept stopping intermittently much to the chagrin of fellow passengers and I. After the grueling couple of hours in this oven-like hall I only found out that my luggage had not arrived. I then turned to a female Customs officer close by for assistance as to how and where to retrieve my luggage. The courteous lady officer went above and beyond the call of duty to lead me to the “Lost & Found” section. At this section there were only two persons ahead of me but, believe it or not, it took another hour before I was attended to. I left the Airport, finally, at 10:40 p.m. local time.
Now, it was time to hit town, and like a prisoner let loose I began a countrywide tour starting June 1, 2014. I was based in Accra and from there I visited places of interest to me which included Tema, Koforidua, Somanya, Kumasi, Kitampo, Ada, Sekondi/Takoradi, Aburi and Axim. Among the conspicuous changes I observed were the huge number of cars of every make and from every corner of the world that had flooded the country and the attendant monstrous traffic and reckless driving; new buildings and gas stations springing up all over the country; buying and selling activity going on everywhere (including busy city streets) making the whole country look like one big Makola market; deteriorating roadways; numerous toll booths on the highways and speed ramps on all roads. Also discernible was the canker of corruption which seems to have woven itself deeply into the very fabric of the Ghanaian society and which, sadly enough, seems to have been accepted by many as a normal way of life.
I do not intend to discuss these observations in much detail but I believe it would be worthwhile commenting a little bit on a few of them.
Road Toll / Deplorable State of Roads
If one takes into consideration the number of vehicles that ply the Ghanaian roads daily and the amount of money collected as tolls on the roads, even by using very conservative estimates, one finds it absolutely outrageous that there could be that many horrible potholed roads in the country, making it seem as if the roads have been left in that state on purpose as job opportunities for the “one man contractor(s)” (i.e. those self appointed road repairers who accost drivers meandering their way between the potholes to demand money for helping out by filling the potholes with silt, mud or humus). The big question then is “where does the toll money go?” Toll money, one would think, should be used partly in paying the salaries of the toll collectors and the greater chunk dedicated to the maintenance of roads and road signs. Sadly, this did not appear to be the case in Ghana. Road signs, as a matter of fact, were either completely non-existent on many roads or had been damaged but left in place; with some pointing in the wrong direction. This state of affairs tends to give some credence to the speculation among many Ghanaians that the funds were either being embezzled by certain individuals, or misapplied. The bottom-line appears to be that the good people of Ghana are either being exploited or simply being robbed in broad daylight at these toll booths. One then wonders who is accountable for the use (or misuse) of these toll monies and when the Ghanaian people would demand accountability from whatever agency is responsible for the collection of the toll.
Speed Ramps
Although speed ramps are desirable on some roads, especially roads in residential neighborhoods, it does not make much sense if they are mounted on high speed highways. When ramps are on the highways they may serve the purpose of making drivers reduce their speeds alright; but that is only if the signs prompting them of the danger ahead are conspicuously displayed well ahead of the ramps. The down side of having ramps on the highways is what would happen if drivers do not see the alert sign at all or early enough. The consequences, of course, could be catastrophic. On my rounds across the country I came across a number of such alert signs located right where the ramps are (not before the ramps) and in some cases they were blocked from the driver’s view by shrubs, low-hanging foliage or a hawker’s canopy by the roadside while in other cases they are completely missing. Worse still, is where locals decide, taking the law into their own hands, to lay their own ramps on the public roads running through their towns without regard to any specific design standards or the consequential damage to vehicles using the roads. Much as the motivation for ramps on the highways is appreciated I believe putting up low-speed-limit signs and ensuring the enforcement of these limits by police would be a much better alternative. With the enforced speed limits drivers will slow down as desired; no damage will be caused to any vehicles whether speeding or not; and drivers not obeying the speed limits would be fined heavily to generate revenue for the state or maybe, regrettably, for the police officers on duty. The latter, however, is still to be preferred to the risk to life and property that the unmarked speed ramps present for motorists, and in particular, for tourists driving at night.
Corruption
Police
My first encounter with the police while in Ghana was one evening at about 9:00 p.m. when I was returning home from an errand in Tema. The police, apparently on routine check at some point near East Legon, signaled me to stop and I did. One of them came close by, greeted in an overly friendly manner and then dropped the bombshell: “Nana, se woara wonim se okyena wo mma be didi”(meaning Big man, you know your children will need to eat tomorrow, right?) and when I replied in the affirmative he went on to say in the same dialect “ then do something”. I then chuckled and ended the conversation by assuring him that I would “do something” the next day. This embarrassing scenario occurred two more times on different nights at the same check point and I decided to abandon that route altogether at night till I finally left Ghana.
Offices
The next episode was when I accompanied a lady friend of mine to the Lands Department at the Cantonments in Accra on three occasions to verify if a parcel of land she had purchased some years back was still registered in her name since someone else had encroached on the property and left threatening notices to the effect that my friend should keep off or be at risk. Our first and second visits to the Department were just time wasted. Nobody we talked to appeared willing and ready to undertake the task of ‘going through the myriads of files’ the same day to get us the information we were looking for; so we were asked to ‘go and come tomorrow’. For these two days I kept wondering what kind of files they were referring to in this day and age. Then the third day came and we went there again. This time my friend had the presence of mind, approached one of the employees at random, narrated her story, squeezed two fifty-cedi notes into his hand and in less than thirty minutes we got the result we wanted. When I expressed surprise at his ability to go through the huge pile of files in that relatively short time he was somewhat bewildered and asked ‘what files?’ and then, apparently sensing that I am not a permanent Ghanaian resident added “ei this time we are also advanced here oo; everything is on computer” Excuse me!
My personal experience at the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) office in Accra where I went to check on what retirement benefits were due me for the many years that I had worked in Ghana before leaving for the US was equally frustrating. I was asked a whole lot of silly questions which, of course, I did not have answers for and was also asked to produce documentary proof of employment such as appointment letter(s) etc. Due to time constraint and not being particularly in the mood for argument that day, I just left, abandoning the whole idea of pursuing my legitimate claims.
The General Public
When I got home and expressed my indignation over what happened at these offices to my sister and my niece I became a virtual laughing stock. My niece, in particular, thought it was funny or rather naïve on my part for being “the only sojourner in Jerusalem” that did not know that quid pro quo (and not corruption #@?!) was the order of the day in Ghana. When asked whether she also accepted monies from members of the public for services she officially rendered at her work place her shameless and shocking response was “ei uncle, if I don’t do that I will be left behind and I can’t survive”. This kind of response seems to resonate throughout the country as I have, thereafter, listened to different people in different regions of the country answer similar questions with the same nonchalant attitude.
Airport Security
August 3, 2014 was the date of my departure from Ghana and although the British Airways flight was to take off at 10:30 p.m. I went to check my luggage in at 7:00 p.m. There was a long line of passengers waiting to check-in so I joined them. There were about four or five check-in counters and a cute young lady employee of British Airways was directing passengers to available counters. Before it got to my turn I had observed that after check-in the white passengers turned right and went away while black passengers turned left. My presumption then was that the whites went to board the plane soon after checking in while the blacks wanted to hang around with family and friends a little while longer at the near-by drinking spot before boarding. It was only after I had checked in that I realized my presumption was wrong!
What the young lady was apparently doing aside of directing passengers was asking black passengers who had checked-in their luggage and whom she suspected to be Ghanaians, to go and see some security officers who were strategically poised on the left hand side but a little remote from the check-in counters. When I was asked to follow this protocol my natural reaction was “for what?” She then pretended to be too busy serving those in line and did not have the time to answer my question so she insisted I should just go and see the security personnel standing by. I approached one of the security men and he demanded to see my baggage receipts. After writing down my receipt numbers on a pad which already had quite a lot of such numbers written on it he asked if I had any perishable items in my suit-cases. I answered ‘yes’ and he then pointed out to me the possibility of my luggage being left behind and those items getting perished and that since he had my receipt numbers he was going to ensure that my luggage gets to their destination accompanied. What happened next? Your guess is as good as mine. He prompted me that it was weekend and ‘the boys will need something for the weekend’. He thus put me in a dilemma, big time! Giving him ‘something’ would mean encouraging or even condoning the bad behavior; not giving could spell doom for me since he had my baggage tag numbers and could withhold my luggage perhaps to never arrive at all or arrive late. I chose, at this point, to simply abandon my principles and comply with his demand so I dispensed with my last twenty cedis which I was going to use to entertain my nephews who came to see me off at the airport.
As sinister as this ploy might be one must admit it is ingenious and effective. I hope this experience as narrated here will serve as a wake-up call for the authorities to take immediate steps to stamp out this fraudulent practice in order to forestall a potentially explosive situation of people losing their valuables. After two months in Ghana I hate to say that I am not holding my breath.
Immigration.
It will be recalled that elsewhere in this discourse I mentioned that the Immigration officer who served me on my arrival at the Kotoka International Airport granted me only sixty (60) days stay even though I had opted for a little more than that. This meant that I had to go to the Immigration office at a later date to ask for an extension of my stay. I could read through this ploy by the Immigration department and its staff to make money off of foreigners so I took no chances and went to the Immigration office five days before the expiration of the sixty days to ask for the necessary extension. I met two gentlemen in the office who carefully walked me through the laborious procedure for extending the time for those who would want to overstay. At the end of the exercise they realized that my time lapse was only five days and at that point they explained that I did not need to do the extension since their policy allows for a few days overstay.
The moment of truth came when I had to go through Immigration at the Kotoka International Airport on the day of my departure back to the US. While waiting in line to be cleared by immigration an officer walked to me and asked to see my passport. I obliged and gave it to him. He glanced cursorily through it for a while and then drew my attention to the fact that I had overstayed. I told him I was aware and that I had been to the immigration office to request an extension of stay but was told it was not necessary since the lapse was only a few days. Not satisfied with my response he interjected “this is what they do in the office to mislead people” and left me standing, taking my passport with him. Seconds later I saw him having a discussion with another officer. After that he came back to me and asked me to go and see the other officer who had by then taken his seat in one of the unoccupied cubicles with my passport in hand. I went to that officer as directed and a debate ensued. He asked if I had heard what his colleague had just told me and I responded by reiterating what transpired at the immigration office. He then went on to say that overstaying is a serious offence and that what they had told me at the office was not exactly correct. With my temper flaring up and my voice rising above the babel in the background I asked if the policies at their office were different from those at the airport and whether I should have gone to the airport rather than the office to ask for the extension. At that point he might have had a hunch that I could possibly make trouble for him if he continued to mess with me so he quickly transitioned from his hitherto aggressive and intimidating stance to a more friendly but not entirely congenial position and said “oh boss it’s ok, it’s ok just put something here (pointing to a drawer) before you leave us”. Out of anger for my time wasted I threw two cedis at him in a manner which was void of all decorum, thus drawing the attention of many an inquisitive eye. He then discretely pushed the money back at me and handed me my passport.
Glimmer of Hope
In spite of the hocus-pocus going on in government offices/agencies, within the general public and even in some media houses, coupled with the government’s abysmal performance and lack of transparency, there is still a glimmer of hope for Ghana. Quite an appreciable number of individuals I came into contact with have demonstrated such honesty, incorruptibility and a devotion to duty that was strikingly incongruous with the messy and goofy norm. One such individual who deserves special mention is a gentleman who simply gave his name as Michael Asiedu but who, I later found out, was the Police Commander (yes, you heard me right, Police Commander) in charge of MTTU in the Madina district. This gentleman was off-duty one day, and though dressed in mufti and going about his own business, just went out of his way to assist people in distress on the road, including me, in ways that one cannot imagine. What’s more he refused to accept even a ‘thank you gift’ of any kind or form from the people he had helped. It is my conviction that a time will come when more people like Mr Asiedu will be at the helm of affairs in Ghana and inculcate into those working under them the dignity and decency of doing one’s job with pride and not for bribe. Another good sign is that there is a growing awareness among Ghanaians of their basic rights and of calling government to order by demanding accountability as and when necessary despite the “yen ntie obiaa” stance taken by the latter. Above all, there is a tangible desire or aspiration by many Ghanaians to acquire higher educational qualifications for self improvement and for national development. Surely there is hope for Ghana and I end by advising all Ghanaians both home and abroad to please keep the hope alive, “Daakye ebeye yie!
God bless Ghana!
Written by Mike Olongo, Columbus, Ohio USA //campolongo2011@hotmail.com
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