Ghanaians entered the 4th Republic with some trepidation about our prospects for democracy. After all, the main opposition had boycotted the 1992 Presidential elections.
But there was perceptible optimism when President Kufuor came to power in 2000. For the first time, we had transitioned from one administration to another peacefully, and it was time to reap the democratic dividend; stability, economic progress and democracy.
But after 24 years of formal democracy, optimism, particularly among “democratphiles,” is turning to pessimism! But I say to ‘There is some brightness here! It is not all doom and gloom!
And so I will outline the brightness and then the doom and then the brightness in the gloom!
So first the brightness! There has been considerable economic progress; our cities are growing rapidly fueled by a construction boom, with no end in sight; everyone has a mobile phone and I can easily call my aunt Sycamore at Kwahu Nkwatia; our cities are choked with vehicles and it is with trepidation that I sit in my car to get into Accra, particularly during the rush hour!
And now the gloom! Unfortunately, the economic progress we have experienced has not trickled down! Poverty is still a serious problem and young people are finding it hard to get jobs. The remunerations for those with jobs are minuscule. The cedi has declined at such an alarming rate that we have all lost a significant part of our wealth. “Dumsor” is making life really unbearable and as a result of “Mahamian-Terkpernomics,” when world petrol prices are tumbling around the world, they are soaring here!
And then the doom! But this is not all! There is a crisis of governance! The English call scandals “affairs,” and we could well describe the 4th Republic as the “era of affairs!”; every administration has had some Minister resign over some corruption affair. Sexual affairs are beaucoup and titillating. And who can forget allegations about cocaine affairs? “Scent nu oh! Agyie bebia!”
And now the brightness in the gloom; in spite of all these difficulties, no one has called for overthrows of governments, even when they are thought to be corrupt and incompetent. This is in sharp contrast to the situation in the 1970s, and probably from the time of independence, when a significant part of the populace considered governments to be illegitimate and saw nothing wrong with their overthrow! Then, politicians, who did not like a government, sought fellow travelers in the military to take it out! And military adventurers, seeing opportunity, did not hesitate to take their chances. Today, soldiers are more likely to consider a person who solicited them to overthrow a government, more of a nut case than a traitor. There is growing political maturity in Ghana!
There are reasons for this maturity! First, military adventurism has not improved our lot. But while corrupt and incompetent civilians do not interfere with our liberties, crooked and inept military governments have always denied us our freedoms; a heavy dose of political cynicism is part of political maturity. Secondly, our democracy, in spite of all its imperfections, allows us to vent our discontent. No longer do we have to swallow our anger! Finally, the general shortages of basic goods that characterized the economy in the 1970s and 1980s has been replaced by an abundance of goods, some of poor quality but cheap, others of good quality but expensive. It means that generally, there are goods for all income groups. What people lack is the income with which to purchase quality goods.
And Ghanaians have reacted to the ongoing economic and governance crises in old and new ways. An old way and ineffective way is to strike; medical personnel, lecturers and all manner of government employees have gone on strikes, and when the strikes fail to improve their lot, they live to strike another day! A new way is increased activism; private radio stations have provided ordinary people opportunities to vent their anger at politicians.
More indigenous civil society organizations have cropped up and some like ‘Occupy Ghana’ have organized ‘Red Fridays’ to show their discontent about the consequences of economic mismanagement; ‘Let My Vote Count’ has demonstrated against perceived bias by the Electoral Commission and a film star Yvonne Nelson has organized the first celebrity led demonstration against “dumsor.” What is required is more indigenous civil society organizations, with greater breadth and depth, coordinating their activities to insist that the government of the day avoid misrule and govern with the sole aim of promoting the public interest.
And so “democratphiles,” while we should be concerned about the unfolding crises, there is a lot of brightness still and it is not all doom and gloom!
