What Did Dr Kwame Nkrumah Do Wrongly?

AND WHAT ALSO DID DR JB DANQUAH DO THAT WAS WRONG? I KEEP ASKING, AS WE CONSTANTLY CASTIGATE ONE OR THE OTHER OF THESE TWO MEN FROM TWO OPPOSITE SIDES?

By: OTCHERE DARKO

DR KWAME NKRUMAH: Every time I read or hear condemnations of Dr Kwame Nkrumah by his “arrogant critics” who centre their criticisms on two main things he and his party did while in power in the sixties, I keep asking myself: “what did people expect him to do, given his political background and persuasion, as well as the circumstances that surrounded him? The enactment of the “Preventive Detention Act” and the declaration of Ghana as a “One-party State” are the two main things which Dr Nkrumah’s critics have always accused him of. Both actions, though, were fully endorsed by the Parliament of those days. And if the laws of a country allow something, then it seems to me that, that thing is “legal” when it takes place.

Before Dr Kwame Nkrumah returned to Ghana in 1947 at the invitation of Dr JB Danquah, he, Dr Nkrumah had already aligned himself with the East; had met several Black Revolutionists in America and embraced their teachings; had become anti-West, anti-colonialist and anti-imperialist; and had also become anti-capitalist. It was not surprising, therefore, that two years after accepting the position of full-time General Secretary of the UGCC, Dr Nkrumah decided to quit and form his own party, after realising that members of the party he had joined were ideologically opposite to him. From 1951 to 30th June 1960, Dr Nkrumah’s CPP won every election that was held under the watchful eyes of the British who were still politically in charge of the affairs of the Gold Coast [and later Ghana]. This impressive electoral feat showed that Dr Kwame Nkrumah knew how to communicate ideas to the then people of the Gold Coast, [later Ghana] better than the UGCC and later the NLM and UP. Until the declaration of Ghana as a Republic on 1st July 1960, Dr Nkrumah always ruled the country under a British Governor or Governor-General and could neither rig elections in favour of his CPP, nor sway the country from Western to Eastern ideology. So, nothing during this pre-Republican period should give the Opposition grounds for anger or hostility. Fact!

After voting in favour of the conversion of Ghana into a Republic and proceeding to elect Dr Kwame Nkrumah to be their first President, a man that both the British and members of the then Ghanaian Opposition knew and portrayed as having a communist orientation, the people of Ghana in principle and in practice had accepted Dr Nkrumah, his CPP, and his “leftist” ideas which were later to be expatiated on and concretised into concepts that soon became collectively referred to as “Nkrumaism”, “Scientific Socialism”, or whatever people prefer to call it. Even though he had joined the then Yugoslavia’s Marshall Tito’s Non-Aligned Movement that embodied countries that were not members of the then Eastern and Western Blocs of Military/Ideological Alliances, Dr Nkrumah, it was clear, leaned more towards the Eastern Bloc and never shied to show his allegiance. This was at the time the “Eastern Bloc” led by the Soviet Union was itself doing all it could to woo newly independent countries of Africa away from their former Western “masters” towards the East to embrace the communist or socialist ideology and also to do business with the East without necessarily signing the “Warsaw Pact”. Dr Nkrumah had a full right to embrace whatever political or economic ideology he believed in, including “communism”, in the same way that other people, including Dr JB Danquah, also had full right to embrace whatever political or economic ideology they too believed in, including “capitalism”. If Ghanaians accept this argument, [and we have to accept it if we believe in democracy], then we have to agree that there was nothing wrong with Dr Nkrumah choosing to be a “communist”. Once we agree with this, we can proceed from that premise to determine what communists, communist parties, and communist countries everywhere in the world do.

From the former Soviet Union; to China; to North Korea; to Cuba and wherever; there is no communist country that allowed or allows multiparty democracy or even bipartisanship to operate. In every communist country, there is only one party. Again, in every communist country, all forms of open anti-government actions and agitations are suppressed by the Government. *In the light of these facts about “communism”, why should the declaration of Ghana as a one-party State by Dr Nkrumah and his CPP in the early Nineteen Sixties be a surprise to those who criticised him, when they themselves acknowledged that he was communist? And why, also, should the passing of the “Preventive Detention Act” be seen as “wrong”, if those of us in Ghana today acknowledge that no communist country in the world at that time and now would accept any open anti-government protests, provocations or actions deemed to be “unacceptable” to the Government? We also know that it was not an offence in Ghana under the 1960 Constitution for someone to be a communist. Secondly, it was not against the “spirit” of the 1st Republican Constitution of Ghana for either the “Preventive Detention Act” to be passed into law and adopted or for the country to pass and adopt a law making Ghana a “One-party State”. SO, WHAT PRECISELY DID DR KWAME NKRUMAH AND HIS CPP DO THAT THEY SHOULD NOT HAVE DONE, GIVEN THAT HE WAS A COMMUNIST AND ALSO THAT HE HAD A RIGHT TO LEAD HIS PARTY ALONG THAT LINE?

DR JB DANQUAH: As it is with Dr Nkrumah, every time I read or hear condemnations of Dr JB Danquah by his “self-righteous critics” who centre their criticisms on two main things he and his party members did or were alleged to have done while they were in opposition in the Nineteen Fifties and Sixties, I also keep asking myself: “what did people expect him to do generally, given his political and traditional background, as well as the circumstances that surrounded him? Dr JB Danquah and other key opposition members openly advocated for “Mate Meho” in the mid Fifties, which meant they favoured the “splitting-up of Ghana”. They were also ALLEGED to be behind both the “Kulungugu bomb” that aimed at killing Dr Nkrumah and the 1966 coup that overthrew him.

The case of “Mate Meho” was factual and unfortunate. The UGCC that contested and lost to the CPP the 1951 elections had advocated for a federal system of Government, among other things. Later, in the mid Nineteen-Fifties, the NLM replaced the UGCC and absorbed its members. By this time, the tension between the governing CPP and the opposition NLM had inexplicably “overheated” and was “boiling over”. It was during this time of “heated political development” in the Gold Coast that the so-called “Mate Meho” slogan with its two “split-finger” symbol emerged. *This “Mate Meho” idea was negative, irrelevant, defeatist and bad, in my opinion. I do believe that before its amalgamation with other opposition parties to form the UP, the NLM might have regretted the “Mate Meho” policy they adopted, as opposed to their previous “nobler policy” to move Ghana along a federal line; a nobler idea which the opposition could have continued to explain and preach to Ghanaians for future acceptance, despite its initial rejection.

The allegations of involvement with the “bomb throwing” and the 1966 coup usually levelled against the UP, on the other hand, were either “evidentially unproven” or “politically defensible”, even if they could be proved evidentially. With respect to the “bomb throwing” allegation, after the abortive “Kulungugu bomb”, a certain “Mallam” who threw it was arrested and, therefore, it was possible for Dr JB Danquah and other opposition members to be prosecuted, if there was strong evidence that members of the then opposition were behind it. Soon after that incidence, evidence surfaced to implicate some “CPP insiders” with the bombing. As to whether those CPP members who were implicated acted in concert with the opposition is another matter. If Dr Nkrumah had enough evidence to link the UP with that “Kulungugu bomb”, then his failure to have them prosecuted in court, instead of “detaining opposition members without trial” under the PDA and causing some of them including Dr Danquah to die suspiciously in detention, cost Dr Nkrumah the loss of a better opportunity to deal convincingly and properly with the opposition than using both the PDA’s “detention without trial” and the banning of opposition parties in Ghana which, thereafter, gave them more ammunition to continue to target and use non-conventional methods to overthrow his Government by arguing defensively that he, Dr Nkrumah, and his party had removed from Ghanaians their fundamental human rights to basic freedom, justice and access to the rule of law that required, among other things, that people arrested and detained, after a reasonable period of time, had to be charged and brought before courts of justice, or should be freed. Those removed fundamental human rights also included the right of Ghanaians to join political associations of their free choice and be able to express their opinions freely, including openly opposing the Government through established opposition parties. *When the CPP, through the “PDA” and “one-party system”, removed the right of Ghanaians to access the “rule of law” and justice, or to “play the role of open opposition”, or to openly express views contrary to those held by Dr Nkrumah and the CPP, their Government became despotic and repressive in the eyes of the Opposition. Unless both the internal and external Security network of a country is made “impenetrable”, people who cannot allow their fundamental human rights to be sacrificed will always find a way to overthrow a regime that removes, suppresses or constrains these rights from the people. Continuous suppression of the Opposition in such a situation is like damming a violent river. How long the dam will hold the water at bay will depend on how “rock-solid” it is. A repressive Government can sustain itself in power for only as long as its Security apparatuses remain solid and air-tight, because at all times those who are opposed to the suppression of their fundamental human rights will be looking for the opportunity to “free” themselves. *In short, throughout history, from times before even the coup of “Noble Brutus” against “Mighty Caesar” around 44BC, people who feel that their fundamental human rights have been taken from them by despots and who, accordingly, feel that they have no legitimate avenue to lawfully remove such dictators or their repressive governments always hold the belief that it is POLITICALLY JUSTIFIED to use any form of “deadly arsenal” at despotic leaders to “eliminate them” or “use coups to overthrow” their governments, where they can. *SO, WHAT DID DR JB DANQUAH AND HIS U.P DO THAT “YOU” WOULD NOT HAVE DONE IF YOU WERE IN THEIR SHOES, GIVEN THE FACTS ABOVE?

MY CONCLUSION AND ADVICE: Both Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah and Dr JB Danquah did what they each had to do, given the “special circumstances” in which they each found themselves. The Nineteen-Fifties and Sixties that coincided with the pubertal period of the “Cold War” were a different time in a different world that played “tug of war” with two opposing politicians who followed two antagonistic political ideologies that sought to cut each other’s throat. INSTEAD OF CONTINUOUS CONDEMNATION AND COUNTER-CONDEMNATION OF THESE TWO LEADERS BY TWO OPPOSING SIDES, WE, GHANAIAN POLITICIANS AND POLITICAL ANALYSTS OF TODAY MUST STUDY WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN DONE BETTER BY THESE TWO GHANAIAN PATRIARCHS TO LESSEN THE TENSIONS THAT DEVELOPED BETWEEN THEM. We must then use that knowledge to guide us to develop among ourselves better inter-party relationships. *After over 50 years since the “dirty politics” of the Nineteen-Fifties and Sixties began to develop between our two most important political figures and their parties, what have we, Ghanaians of today, learned to do better than what the two leaders did in the past? *Are we not still doing the same things that the two leaders did in the past? LET WHAT IS HAPPENING NOW BETWEEN NDC AND NPP HELP US TO GET THE ANSWERS TO THE LAST TWO QUESTIONS BEFORE ANY OF US “ARROGANTLY” AND “SELF-RIGHTEOUSLY” CONTINUE TO “BOMBARD” EITHER OF THESE TWO DECENT, PATRIOTIC, AND DEDICATED PATRIARCHS WHO GAVE THEIR LIVES FOR THIS COUNTRY. OUR HABIT OF LOOKING AT THINGS WITH ONE OF OUR EYES CLOSED IS NOT HELPING OUR NATION TO DEVELOP SMOOTHLY.

SOURCE: OTCHERE DARKO; [The writer holds a deep admiration for both Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah and Dr JB Danquah; a conjoined admiration that may seem, to others, to be incoherent and impossible to be contemplated, let alone to be held].