"Ghanaians Must Learn to Forgive and Forget"
History will always recall how it was before those young men from the barracks put their lives at stake and rose up for the justice which eluded the society for long. (Remember the market woman who poured a pot full of urine on a soldier who was just trying to prevent cheating). Unlike the previous coups, theirs was for a true transformation. Today, as it is and always will be, those gallant men of the nation are being ridiculed. These young men did not go to war to defend their country to claim any hero status, but woke up that dawn to redeem their fellow countrymen and women from years of neglect, suffering and selfishness. As they did, they became part of our national History. That was nearly three decades ago, long before I ever gain any meaningful political maturity. I was in my early twenties, a young man any lady would like to sleep with, even if just for fun. But no, my conscience couldn't allow me to talk to one, for the fear I wouldn't be able to meet the demands of any consequences. (Belly Full). You understand what I mean. Any right thinking young man will always be mindful of what he can offer his family. I chose not to play the game ball for that fear of getting wrapped in a family cloth. Life wasn't easy. The suffering was so unbearable that the vast majority of the population were made to swallow those daily hardships in silence, while the very few were living kingly on "Kalabule" then the show of business. The economy melt down was so severe that the whole country was at a stand still. Factories were closing down at an alarming rate and workers were being laid off mercilessly as there was little their employers could do to help. Empty shelves in the stores were all that we could boast of. The cedi became so worthless that thousands were moving in between hands with little or no goods at all to buy. The daily inflation rate was running at its three digits high. Corruption became every body's chewing gum, and so rampant that Ghanaians were leaving in droves to neighboring Nigeria where news had it that milk and honey was flowing everywhere. Thanks to the oil discovery. Many of those our fellow citizens who left to seek economic refuge in Nigeria fell victims to unpardonable brutalities in the hands of their hosts who suppose to protect them. I know not by hearing, but as an eye witness. I remembered clearly when a very desperate young Ghanaian wanting to carry head pans of concrete (Kpompom) for a few naira was paraded through a street in Oshodi, a suburb of Lagos with beatings before his lynching by rounding his neck with lorry tires and setting him ablaze. His crime was sleeping under an over pass because he had no place to lay his head that night. He was taken to be that so called armed rubber. A misery life our leaders forced on us to live. How many can I say here went through the same or similar fates without notice? I have no hatred for our Nigerian brothers and sisters for the maltreatment melted out to us, because I believe now that they were only paying us back in our own coins. The so called 1969 "Aliens Compliance Order" of the Busia Administration which saw many Nigerians humiliated and driven out of Ghana was still fresh in their minds. They couldn't think otherwise than to retaliate. I don't want to recollect here all the memories of the two times that Ghanaians were subjected to those brutal deportations and our inabilities to claim our basic rights of being a Ghanaian.
It was at that height of the mass exodus of Ghanaians in the late 1970's, because of the hardships in the country that we all as Ghanaians hailed and accepted in principle Rawlings and his lieutenants who broke the dawn news on those two occasions to clean up our dirty house.
The first house cleaning which started on June 4th 1979 by the AFRC saw the execution of 8 top Military Officers including three former Heads of State. It did not conclude before the hand-over of power to Dr. Limann, who became a lame duck President supervising a nation with no power of his own to control. The many lessons we learnt from the short stay of the AFRC, that gave us hope for the future started to fade away. We saw the return of old habits. Thus a second house cleaning seemed inevitable. On Dec. 31st 1981, before the third cock crow Ghana's second house cleaning began, this time by the PNDC led again by the same Rawlings. There were casualties as usual, including innocent lives, which is always normal in any transformation. A country goes to war to repel an invasion or to defend its sovereignty, for that course lives of soldiers and some civilians (Collateral Damage) are lost to save many others. Christ came to save all mankind with his innocent blood. Sodom and Gomorra was destroyed that the good apples could live. Noah survived the floods to breed new set of humans that supposed to be free of sins.
"Revolutions are never a tea party" So wisely said by the Chinese. June 4th and Dec, 31st were prescribed medicines, though very bitter but necessary to cure the cancer which was eating deep into our Ghanaian body. As painful as it is for us all especially those who lost family members, we can only think now of the good things which that transformation brought about. Christ was crucified and died faultless and sinless to save the world. We the followers of Christ are being taught every day to be loving, caring, forgiving and much more forgetting.
Transformations took place in other countries such as France, America, Russia, Britain, and China just to mention a few. Forgiveness brought them prosperity. How can we imagine to say the so called Western Revolutions succeeded, which in it's sense good but that of Ghana a failure and bad, even though it may give us the same social, political and economic changes equaling to that of the afore mentioned powers. Their examples rang the awaking bell into our ears. Those courageous boys provided us with the needed tools; it is now left for us to build the boat and to collectively as Ghanaians paddle that boat, the end result will be crossing the Volta Lake with success. After long and strict measures enforced by the PNDC since Dec. 31, 1981 which no other government could initiate, many aspects of our rotten lives were changed. Ghanaians went to the pools in 1992 to elect their leaders. The promulgation of a new constitution paved the way. Even though boycotted by the then opposition party (NPP) it was free and fair and won by the NDC. There was another peaceful election in 1996. The opposition won the 2000 elections and took over power, the first in our History that an elected President handed over power to another. Democracy on course, the product of Rawlings and his men made for Ghana.
Have we ever had it so good? Ghana can now pride itself with many benefits of what a transformation has to give, which in this sense the very good things those young soldiers promised us. We are all now partakers of the fruits of that wake up call from those selfless men who put their lives on line for the Ghana, the nation they so much loved. Ghana those days was an empty house full of dirt but today walking around Kwame Nkrumah Circle one can spot the latest Toyota cars which are yet to be driven on the streets of Tokyo. Much more, Accra has seen a hundred fold expansion with modern houses. Makola Market has bounced back with stalls struggling to cope with-+ many goods to take in. The sounds and lights of electronic products all around the vicinity of UTC can be compared to that of (Akihabara) the electronic city of Tokyo.
We should accept the fact that, sometimes the left arm should be cut off if it is infected with cancer for the rest of the body to live. Until all as Ghanaians come to the realization of this simple truth, we will make the U turn, not the "Forward Ever" Nkrumah assured us.
God Bless Our Homeland Ghana And Long Live The Black Star.
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