Ghana
- A transition of Hope and Trepidation
Paper on the 7 Dec. Elections in Ghana
Introduction
Ghana has organised two general elections since the transition to
multi-party elections in 1992. However,
a dilemma faces Ghanaians as they queue up at polling booths on 7
December to vote in presidential and legislative elections.
To the cynic, the previous elections were nothing more than
‘donor’ democracy – a veneer of legitimacy that allowed
international corporations and financial institutions to continue doing
business with an otherwise military-led dictatorship with a ‘clear’
conscience and without barracking from radical pressure groups.
Inside Ghana, pro-democracy forces saw them only as a transition
within a transition, a constitutional own goal that would ease Flt. Lt.
(Rtd.) Jerry John Rawlings out of power once his two-term limit came to
an end, thereby ushering in the genuine transition.
That moment of truth has finally arrived.
As Ghanaians take stock of Rawlings’s 21-year dominance of Ghanaian
politics, it is necessary to look back at two preceding periods in
Ghana’s History: the era of President Kwame Nkrumah and his Convention
People’s Party (1951-1966); and the era of stagnation (1966-1981).
Analysis of the period between 1966 and 1981 will allow the
reader to put President Rawlings’s achievements into perspective.
A brief sketch of the Nkrumah era is important for three reasons.
Firstly, since his coup d’état
of December 1981 President Rawlings, depending on circumstances, has
appropriated and at the same time deprecated the legacies of the
Nkrumah. Secondly, it
allows a useful comparison of the two diametrically opposed
developmental models – one based on state-driven internal
capacity-building and resource mobilisation aimed at development, and
the other based on the laissez-faire approach dictated by international
financial institutions and targeted at growth.
Finally, no other leader has captured the imagination of
Ghanaians and Africans the way the two leaders have done
II.
Background to Jerry Rawlings’s Rule
The
Nkrumah Era (1951-1966)
Ghana
led the post-World War II struggle to rid Black Africa of the colonial
yoke. Two factors made this
possible. She attained
self-government with British oversight in 1951, followed by formal
independence in March 1957. She
thus became the first colony to pry open the floodgates to the
independence wave that swept Black Africa in the 1960s, becoming in the
process, a path-blazer and an example to other anti-colonial fighters.
And in her first president, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana was blessed
with a cerebral and radical leader.
His internal developmental project rapidly laid a robust
foundation for economic take-off and social well-being for the
dispossessed. His mass
education programme drastically cut down on illiteracy while the
discriminatory educational policy in favour of the then backward parts
of Ghana rapidly closed the development gap between the north and the
south. Perhaps this policy,
more than any other, rooted out ethnic animosity from the Ghanaian
society. On the continent,
his forward-looking Pan-Africanist agenda amplified the country’s
world profile far beyond her size and resources.
By 1960, the first-past-the post Westminster-style electoral system that
had been put in place by the departing colonial authorities had
effectively reduced Ghana to a bi-partisan system of government.
The United Party – offshoot of the first political party
in Ghana, the conservative United Gold Coast[1]
Convention – constituted the main opposition to Nkrumah’s Convention
People’s Party. Swayed
by the one-party temptation of independence leaders and given the
perfect excuse by the UP’s disruptive and, at times violent opposition
methods, Nkrumah turned the country into a Republic and a one-party
state in 1960 through a referendum.
CPP was overthrown in a coup d’état
in February 1966 by a conspiratorial alliance of conservative military
officers and civilians, the consequences of a combination of factors.
Internally, the rapid economic development that saw Ghana’s per capita
income compare favourably with countries such as South Korea, had begun
to falter by 1965 on the back of a global recession and the incompetent,
unaccountable and corrupt bureaucracy that the CPP party machine had
become. To his credit,
Nkrumah took both administrative and disciplinary measures in an effort
to stamp out corruption within the party.
However, his justifiable preoccupation with issues of African
unity and integration divided his attention.
Besides, his efforts to develop young and competent cadres
through a radical educational programme had not yet yielded any
replacement capacity. The result was that CPP was unable to create the
institutions and norms for democracy, development and the peaceful
exercise and transfer of power. Leading members of the banned UP were
meanwhile employing extra-parliamentary methods within and outside the
country to cripple and undermine the government. The much-talked about
Preventive Detention Act which allowed the regime to detain opponents
without due legal process was, in part, a consequence of such opposition
activity.
From the outside, Nkrumah was associated with the communist camp by the
West because of his anti-imperialist stance and fight against
neo-colonialism in Africa. Thus,
in addition to the effects of global recession on the economy, the US
and UK blocked external financial assistance for the CPP’s
industrialisation programme and artificially forced down the world
market price for cocoa to further starve the country of resources.
Eventually, the CIA and British intelligence facilitated the
CPP’s overthrow in 1966.
III.
The Wilderness Years - 1966 to 1981
Between
1966 and 1981, Ghana experienced two brief spells of multi-party
constitutional rule. The
conservative Progress Party led by Dr. Kofi Abrefa Busia ruled
under the Westminster-style parliamentary democracy and lasted between
September 1969 and January 1972, while the Dr. Hilla Limann-led neo-Nkrumahist
People’s National Party presided over an American-style
presidential system between September 1979 and December 1981.
Ghana spent the remaining years under military juntas.
A major accusation against the Nkrumah regime was that Ghana was
biting off more than she could chew by putting too much emphasis on the
Pan-Africanist agenda, while not doing enough on the domestic front.
Consequently, the regimes after 1966 became more inward looking.
However, with the exception of a brief period (1972-1975) under
the National Redemption Council junta, no meaningful programme of
internal mobilisation of human and material resources was put in place.
The post-1966 politico-economic agenda was based on one strategy:
rolling back Nkrumah’s state interventionist programme through
liberalisation. The IMF and
World Bank dictated terms. However,
despite the promise of substantial foreign capital inflow (particularly
between 1966 and 1971), the failure to satisfy donor conditionalities
hampered the release of funds. Besides,
none of the subsequent regimes managed to put in place any meaningful
macro-economic framework for economic reform that would spur
industrialisation tied to and benefiting from Ghana’s rich
agricultural and mineral endowment.
Thus, Ghana has continued to rely on the much-maligned socioeconomic
foundations laid by Kwame Nkrumah. The agricultural and mineral
processing factories built by Nkrumah constituted Ghana’s main
manufacturing base - the Ghana Industrial Holding Corporation; Tema, the
port city created by Nkrumah remains the key powerhouse and window for
Ghana’s foreign trade; the Akosombo Hydro-Electric project continues
to soften the blows of the world energy crisis on Ghana.
Pretty little, in terms of input has been added to the
educational and health delivery systems put in place before 1966.
It is true that by leading the country into a one-party system of rule,
Nkrumah’s CPP failed to lay the foundations for competitive and
accountable governance. By
the same token, it was unable to put in place the necessary safeguards
against bureaucratic excesses, impunity and corruption.
The paralysis that has afflicted the CPP after Nkrumah’s
overthrow owed much to the fact that the party was outlawed for a long
time; it is equally true to say that the indiscipline and impunity had
reduced the party to a bureaucratic shell devoid of purpose and
direction without the leadership and moral authority of Nkrumah.
However, none of the subsequent regimes could match the party’s
socioeconomic achievements nor better its human rights record.
On the contrary Ghana, under the regimes that followed, abdicated
her continental responsibility so coveted under Nkrumah, while sinking
deeper into socioeconomic wilderness.
Dr. Busia, who came to power promising unlimited human rights and
democracy, soon abolished the Trades Union Congress and refused to
recognise the ruling of the Supreme Court.
Unable to check the economic free fall that characterised Ghana,
he found scapegoats in the productive migrant community who had hitherto
buoyed the cocoa industry and retail trade.
In 1969 millions of Nigerians, Burkinabe, Togolese and other West
African nationals were forcibly deported from the country under the
draconian Aliens Compliance Order.
By 1979, economic paralysis had become total.
Corruption had become endemic under the elaborate patronage
system fostered by the military. To
prolong its stay and placate the angry workers, students and the
civilian political elite, General Acheampong’s Supreme Military
Council junta, which had seized power in 1972, floated the idea of
non-party Union Government in 1978.
The fierce resistance to the unpopular concept from civil society
provoked mass unrest and brought the country to the brink of a civil
war. Young and disaffected
other ranks in the army stepped in on 4 June 1979 to diffuse the
revolutionary situation.
IV.
The Rawlings Phenomenon in Ghana
The junior officers created
the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council under the dual leadership of Flt.
Lt. Jerry J. Rawlings and Major K. Boakye Gyan.
In a dramatic three-month reign of terror, they set about
cleaning the corrupt stables that Ghana had become with guns.
When they were done, eight army Generals, including three former
Heads of State, had been executed, the Accra Makola Market, the main
source of livelihood to the women, lay in ruins and several properties
had been confiscated in the bid to recover stolen monies and back taxes.
Clearly unable to agree among them on the way forward, the AFRC
leadership could not hang on to power for long.
In September, power was transferred to Dr. Hilla Limann and his People’s
National Party following, arguably, the freest elections in
Ghana’s history to date.
The PNP could not have arrived on the political scene at a worse time.
Expectations were high. The
plank of moral and financial accountability for leaders had been set
impossibly high by the events of June 4th. The economic
situation had become even more dire after the excesses of the AFRC.
Nigeria had placed an oil embargo on the country and foreign
donors had frozen assistance in protest at the abuses by the junta.
Though these sanctions were lifted when Limann was elected President,
their effects followed the PNP into its first two years in office.
To make matters worse, the new President wielded no control
within his party. He was
weak as a leader and struggled to convince Ghanaians of his competence
and authority. By 1981,
corruption was gradually creeping back and the students and workers were
revving up for a new round of protests.
Flt. Lt. Rawlings seized the opportunity, overthrowing the
constitutional order on 31 December 1981.
This time, his Provisional National Defence Council had
come to stay. Since 1981,
Flt. Lt. Rawlings has led Ghana on a roller-coaster that is as rich and
contradictory in political and economic experimentation as it is
controversial in terms of its record on human rights and the rule of
law. In this lies the
significance of the 7 December 2000 general elections.
V.
THE LEGACY
A.
Economic Reform
Arguably, it is in the field of
economic reform that Ghana has seen the most remarkable transformation
under the PNDC and its successor party, the National Democratic
Congress. At the time
the PNDC seized power, Ghana was in a state of paralysis.
‘Available disposable resources for imports were US$330 million
as against short term debts of US$348 million’.
The cocoa, gold and diamond industries, the mainstay of Ghana’s
economy, had collapsed. The
high rate of the local currency, the Cedi (C2.75 to the dollar at the
time) had led to a booming illegal trade in currencies, inflation was
galloping and social services had ground to a halt.
To make matters worse, Ghana was hit by the worst drought in
living memory at a time when Nigeria had expelled hundreds of thousands
of Ghanaian immigrants.
Judged against this background, Ghana has made giant strides in boosting
production and creating favourable conditions for foreign and local
investment under the Economic Recovery Programmes (ERP) started in 1983.
Since then, Ghana has managed to stabilise the economy through
IMF/World Bank economic liberalisation policies.
Privatisation
The cornerstone of the ERP has
been the massive privatisation of state industries.
The mineral sector, particularly the gold and diamonds industries
were privatised and tax incentives introduced to boost production.
Similar measures were employed in the food processing and
telecommunications industries.
Agriculture
On the one hand, the PNDC
encouraged increased production of cash crops such as the country’s
economic mainstay, cocoa, by introducing cash incentives to farmers.
On the other hand, attempts were made to diversify the
agricultural base into such non-traditional sectors as pineapple and
cashew nut production.
Financial policies
Foreign currency speculation constituted a major problem in the Ghanaian
economy, given the unrealistic value of the Cedi against major foreign
currencies. By introducing
deregulation and instilling discipline in money supply, the parallel
currency market began to shrink while inflation was brought down from
three digit figures to an average of 12-14% in the 1990s.
Foreign investors began to show interest, at least in the
banking, telecommunication, tourist and extraction sectors.
The establishment of the stock exchange also gave a boost to the
economy.
Consequences
The Positives
The results of the Government’s
economic reforms have been mixed. From
the mid 1980s through the 1990s Ghana enjoyed the confidence of the
donor community and attracted foreign investors, particularly from
South-East Asia. Perhaps
the dividend from the economic policies is more visible in the
restoration and development of social and economic infrastructure.
The major cities have witnessed the revamp of the
telecommunication system & resurfacing of roads.
Trunk and feeder roads have been constructed or restored to
facilitate communication between the rural and urban centres.
The rural areas have benefited immensely from the extension of
electricity from central grids and the supply of drinkable water and
primary health care.
In the last few years, Ghana has witnessed a quantitative change in
educational facilities under the reform programme.
From three, the number of universities has shot up to eight,
including three private universities.
This has boosted university intake from around 10 000 to 36 000.
At the lower levels, the break-up of pre-university education
into Junior and senior Secondary Schools and the drastic reduction in
the duration of pre-university studies have led to an expansion in the
intake of pupils. The
downside is that, the quality of education has greatly suffered due to
insufficient school materials and shortages of qualified teachers.
The result has been the alarming decline in educational
standards. Children of
Government functionaries and the elite are abandoning these schools for
private schools at home and abroad.
The relative tranquillity in Ghana has made her tourist-friendly and has
attracted, on average, over 300,000 foreign visitors annually since
1996.
Throughout the 1990s Ghana enjoyed a steady real GDP growth of between 4
and 5 percent while inflation steadily dropped from around 116% in 1981
to around 13% in 1998. More
importantly, gold has outstripped cocoa as the mainstay of Ghana’s
foreign trade, recording an export value of US$682 million in 1999 as
against US$621 million from cocoa.
The Negatives
As in all IMF-imposed programmes
driven by liberalisation, ERP has left in its trail, structural
imbalances in the economy and crippling social problems for the
vulnerable. The much talked
about diversification of the agricultural base did not emphasise
production for consumption but for export.
As a consequence Ghana, which has enough rice-sustainable land
not only to feed herself but to satisfy regional demand in West Africa,
has become an importer of rice. There
is disincentive due to a lack of effective government interest in food
production. Indeed, any
significantly adverse weather could plunge the country into famine.
Meanwhile the pineapples and nuts that she produces have
faced even stiffer competition and barriers in the international market
than cocoa.
The industrial base remains precariously weak, accounting for under 15%
of GDP, with manufacturing taking only 8%.
The weakness of the economy puts it at the mercy of international
financial hiccups, particularly as they affect the externally-dictated
commodity prices. Ghana’s
imports have consistently outstripped exports throughout the 1990s by
almost 2 to 1. This means,
in part, that Ghana has spent the ERP years servicing huge loans that
have done little to lay a sound foundation for economic take-off.
When the PNDC seized power in 1981 Ghana’s external debts stood
at just over a billion US dollars.
As President Rawlings prepares to step down, he leaves Ghana with
over US$7 billion debt and a Cedi that is in free fall.
In December last year a dollar fetched just over C3500; by
November this year it had shot to C10000.
The privatisation programme also spewed a patrimonial system based on
cronyism and institutional graft. The
parastatals and government bodies that were staffed by PNDC/NDC
stalwarts and that were charged with economic development, either
misused funds or diverted resources.
Dr. Kwesi Botchway, the former Finance Minister and architect of
ERP, resigned in disgust, accusing Mr. Tsatsu Tsikata, head of the Ghana
National Petroleum Commission and close ally of Rawlings of embezzling
government funds. The
National Economic Planning Commission has also been accused of
embezzlement and incompetence. Meanwhile,
party strongmen made use of their closeness to power to buy off state
enterprises on the cheap or received huge soft loans to set up
businesses. CASHPRO, the
biggest cocoa-buying company and one of the largest to be listed on the
stock exchange is headed by Mr. Kwamena Awhoi, a party veteran.
Social Depression
The emphasis on subsidy removal
from state institutions has largely turned hospitals and educational
institutions into cash-and-carry establishments even as chronic
unemployment and casualisation characterise the labour market.
B.
Political Reform
The Provisional National Defence Council was created ostensibly to lead
Ghana in making ‘nothing short of a revolution’.
From the onset, People’s and Workers’ Defence Committees were
set up as the basic units of administration in the communities and at
the factory floors. Similar
structures sprang up in the Army and Police.
Special Tribunals that meted out almost instant justice to
‘saboteurs’ and criminals supplanted the justice system.
With time, the regime set up District Assemblies as the bedrock
of local government with the intention that a vertical system of
government from the local to the national level would evolve, presumably
under a non-party framework.
The internal and external pressures for political liberalisation
beginning in the late 1980s put paid to this design.
To derive maximum benefits from an imposed agenda, the PNDC
accommodated the political structures it had nurtured into a new
Constitution that was adopted in 1990 for multi-party democracy.
Thus, the District Assemblies were incorporated into the
Constitution but remained largely under the control of the PNDC.
The PNDC itself was transformed into a political party – The
National Democratic Convention. To
enable it to readjust from its command-administrative style of
governance to the demands of persuasive politics, the NDC was obliged to
open its doors to influential political forces hitherto outside the
regime. To accommodate the
newcomers, long-serving political cadres who supported the PNDC through
thick and thin were relocated to the District Assemblies and the several
independent Commissions set up under the new constitution.
The PNDC’s modus operandi has been based on the eclectic fusion
of elements of the CPP’s grassroots mobilisation and pro-rural
development agenda on the one hand, and the free marketeering policies
of the UP tradition. What
remains uniquely PNDC’s is the lack of hesitation in using violence to
achieve its goals. Peaceful
demonstrators have been shot dead by pro-regime thugs even in the era of
transition while Government ministers attack opponents with weapons.
It is no surprise that several Nkrumahist, and UP politicians
easily explain away why they have joined the PNDC/NDC.
The strategy was aimed at carving out the centrist ground of
Ghanaian political traditions and creating a giant non-party structure
supported by an imposing security apparatus.
The enforced return to constitutional rule altered this scenario,
but the strategy has turned the NDC into the most dominant political
force in Ghana today. It is
doubtful, however, that the party can maintain its fortunes for long
after the exit of President Rawlings.
Thus, by the time Ghanaians went to the polls in November 1992 the
political turf, in terms of material and human resources, had been
carefully re-laid in favour of the PNDC.
The
Security Situation
Of all the accomplishments that the
PNDC/NDC ascribes to its tenure of
office, the economy and stability vie for pride of place.
By and large Ghana has avoided the debilitating wars that have
afflicted her neighbours to the West.
Since 1981, Ghana has faced two main threats of conflict.
The first was the result mainly of intra-PNDC struggles for power
between 1982 and 1984 and the elimination of perceived ‘enemies of the
revolution’. The second
was a localised war in the Northern Region (1994-1995) between the
Nanumba and Konkomba that claimed at least 3000 lives.
According to the regime’s own admission, 107 people were
executed for various offences between 1983 and 1989[3].
The actual figure could be anywhere between 1000 and 2000.
These figures put Ghana’s ‘stability’ over the last 21 years in
perspective. By any stretch
of the imagination, the PNDC has been the most brutal regime in
Ghana’s History. No other
regime comes remotely close to it in terms of human rights abuses or
sheer impunity. It is
therefore fair to say that Ghana’s stability has been achieved at an
intolerable price and has been guaranteed more by the repressive state
machine than any societal consensus derived from the assurance of basic
human needs and rights. Whenever
discussions turn to impunity in Ghana under the PNDC, attention is
usually focused on the murder of high profile figures, such as the
abduction and murder of the three high flying High Court judges in 1983.
However, several hundred military and police personnel,
workers’ leaders, political activists and journalists lost their lives
through summary execution and disappearances in the heady days of
1982-1985.[4]
The instruments of oppression under the PNDC were many and varied.
They included the notorious Bureau of National Investigation (BNI),
the Special Reserve Battalion (an army within the army, answerable only
to the President and made up of Cuban-trained commandos), the Special
Tribunals and several other paramilitary groups.
Between them, they have carried out or supervised murder,
disappearances, torture and harassment.
By and large, these structures have remained intact even after
the transition to multi-party democracy in 1992.
They have been accommodated in the new Constitution but, under
the new democratic dispensation, they have increasingly come under
greater scrutiny by civil society.
A spin-off from the gun culture that characterised the early years of
the PNDC, as well as from the Nanumba-Konkomba conflict, is that
thousands of AK-47 assault rifles and other small arms have diffused
into society. Several
remain buried in caches and homes and constitute a security threat to
the country.
The desire by sections of the society to seek retribution for gross
human rights abuses, the debate about the future role of these
structures and, more importantly, how to ensure continued stability
without such overtly repressive structures, have become central to the
discourse on the future direction of post-Rawlings Ghana.
Important, to this end, will be the fate of the indemnity clauses
that the PNDC inserted into the new Constitution to safeguard
individuals associated with impunity from prosecution.
Ghana and West Africa
Foreign policy has been positive and forward-looking under the PNDC.
Between 1966 and 1981, Ghana experienced a major paradigm shift
away from the pro-active, hands-on approach of ex-President Kwame
Nkrumah and his CPP to continental and world issues, towards a more
inward-looking attitude. Since
1982, however, Ghana has gone into overdrive in seeking solutions to
conflicts in the West African sub-region, particularly in Liberia and
Sierra Leone. She has been
a major net-intaker of refugees from the conflict zones and, alongside
Nigeria, has led from the front in the search for peace.
Ghanaian peacekeepers have become a common feature in the
world’s hot stops – in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Lebanon and
Cambodia. Ghana has
likewise become a key player in the processes of economic integration
within the Economic Community of West African States.
She has, however, not had the best of relations with her
immediate neighbours. Though
tensions have abated considerably in the last few years, Jerry
Rawlings’ tenure of office was marked by a love and hate relationship
with Togo in particular, and also Burkina Faso and Cote d’Ivoire.
Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, mutual accusations of
destabilisation marred relations between Ghana and her three neighbours.
Ghanaian opponents of Rawlings received sanctuary in Lomé
and Abidjan. The Togolese
dictator, President Gnasingbé
Eyadéma
often accused the Ghanaian regime of supporting armed incursions by
Ghana-based Togolese dissidents, who were of the same Ewe ethnic
extraction as President Rawlings.
Civil Society
The
Student Movement:
Arguably, the student movement has been the ultimate catalyst of all
major political changes in post-independent Ghana.
The National Union of Ghana Students invariably sparked protests
against incompetent, corrupt or repressive administrations in the past,
before even the labour movement. The
Union initially provided President Rawlings with the base to launch his
political career by its unflinching support to him during the AFRC era
(June-September 1979) and in the run-up to the coup of 1981.
Since 1982, however, its capacity as chief watchdog has been
greatly weakened by the PNDC and it is still struggling to recover.
Aware of the threat posed by the students, the PNDC applied a
combination of measures to blunt its cutting edge. First, former high
profile student leaders, such as Annor Kumi, Yaw Donkor and Kofi
Totobi-Quatchie were drafted into the security machine of the PNDC.
By using student agents provocateurs within the student
movement to disrupt strategy and by mobilising the unemployed and lumpen
elements to confront student demonstrations, the movement was left
prostate. Second, the introduction of ERP hit the students hard.
By removing subsidies from tertiary education and introducing
school fees students were forced, under pressure from parents, to
downgrade activism and concentrate on finishing their education as early
as possible. The drastic
reduction in the duration of pre-university education under the ERP-dictated
educational restructuring process, also opened the doors to students who
were too young and uncommitted to engage in activism.
The labour movement also suffered similar infiltration and disruption
from within and without. Independent-minded
leaders were forced out of office, undermined or forced to flee the
country, while individuals who were loyal to the regime forced their way
into leadership; the Workers Defence Committees, appendages to the
regime, effectively supplanted the unions at the factory floors.
QUANGOs
In the interim, quasi-government organisations filled the civil society
vacuum. The People’s and
Workers’ defence Committees, the Mobisquads of the National
Mobilisation Programme, the pro-PNDC June 4 Movement and the 31st
December Women’s Organisation played the double role of government
support planks and civil society activists.
Non
Governmental Organisations
This state of affairs did not, however, hamper the development of
alternative sites of contestation in civil society organisations.
Since the mid-eighties, a general consensus has emerged within
the international community to adopt a pragmatic attitude in support of
democratisation in the Third World.
On the one hand, funding agencies have encouraged or pressured
autocratic regimes to loosen their grip on the State.
On the other, they have financially supported capacity-building
within civil society to enable NGOs to force open democratic space.
As a consequence, an impressive number of relatively independent
NGOs and media emerged. Among
these were groups like the Institute of Economic Affairs, ISODEC and its
organ, Public Agenda, and the Ghana Committee on Human and People’s
Rights. This yielded a
two-fold dividend. Firstly,
independent-minded pro-democracy and human rights activists who would
otherwise have either been forced to leave the country or to remain
silent to avoid being thrown out of the patrimonial economic system,
were able to fend for themselves and speak their mind.
Secondly, these organisations and individual activists
constituted themselves into watch-dogs over the Constitution, taking the
Government to task over non-compliance, and holding the security
agencies responsible for violations of human rights.
The result has been impressive. The
Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justice and the Media
Commission, among others, have made giant strides in the attempts to
assert their professionalism and independence as envisaged under the
Constitution. CHRAJ has
chalked-up landmark victories over the Government while the Media
Commission is strengthening its oversight role of the media, including
the state media. With the
proliferation of frequency modulation stations and a vibrant private
press, Ghana has seen the evolution and modest consolidation of
democracy-supporting institutions.
It is a measure of the increasing maturity of Ghana’s civil society
that, once it had discovered that open and violent confrontation would
only play into the hands of the security-conscious regime, it switched
to the tactics of nudging President Rawlings towards the exit door,
using constitutional leverages. So
far, this tactic has worked to near perfection: the rule of law is
gradually taking hold and President Rawlings is reluctantly quitting his
post under the terms of the Constitution he masterminded.
Problems, however, persist. Civil
society institutions remain structurally, professionally and financially
weak while much of the private press is yet to rise above partisanship.
This is to be expected, given the long years of dictatorship.
Summing up the Rawlings
Effect
In summing up the Rawlings phenomenon in Ghanaian politics, it would not
be an overstatement to conclude that not since the rule of President
Kwame Nkrumah had an individual come to symbolise the fears and
aspirations of the nation as the outgoing President.
A generation of Ghanaians associates politics in Ghana only with
his reign and his formal departure from the political scene marks the
end of an era. He came in
as a coup plotter; he wants to exit as a democratically elected
president and statesman at the end of his term of office.
He seized power as a firebrand angry at the neo-colonial order in
Ghana and calling for ‘nothing short of a revolution’ to transform
the system; he departs as the most tamed IMF/World Bank disciple in
Ghana’s history. He
descended on the Ghanaian scene promising to instil probity and
accountability into the moral fabric of society; many may argue that
patrimonialism and institutional graft have scaled new heights as he
ends his reign. As he steps
down after the coming elections, public opinion on his era is divided
down the middle as to the legacy he leaves behind.
Some see him as a charismatic Messiah who pulled Ghana away from
the brink of collapse. Others
cannot wait to see the back of him, accusing him of being a Right
Bonapartist who, for 21 years, took the country for a ride, leaving it
not any better than he found it.
VI.
The December 2000 Elections
Ghana has held two multi-party
elections, both of which predictably returned the NDC to power, since
1992. The 7 December 2000
presidential and legislative elections have taken on a new meaning
because of the mandatory exit of Jerry Rawlings from office. As the
electorate take to the polls on December 7 without the incumbent the
focus of the campaigns has shifted, on the one hand, from personalities
to two issues: Change for the opposition, Continuity for
the NDC; on the other hand, heated debates among the candidates have
centred on the economy and corruption, human rights
and ethnicity.
Ethnicity: The Politics of Mensahs and Mahamas
With the exception of the
inter-ethnic violence (particularly in the Asantelands) in the run up to
independence and the secessionist movement in the Ewe-dominated Volta
Region in the 1970s, Ghana has been a model of ethnic harmony.
Arguably, she remains one of the very few oases of calm on the
African continent as far as ethnicity is concerned.
Credit for this goes largely to the inclusive policies adopted by
Kwame Nkrumah and the CPP (See Section on Nkrumah’s rule above).
Indeed, since independence, the election of leaders into high
office has been based on the popularity and strength of their parties
rather than their ethnic origin. Thus,
Kwame Nkrumah (Ethnicity: Nzema; 1951-1966), Kofi Abrefa Busia
(Ethnicity: Brong; 1969-1972), Hilla Limann (Ethnicity: Dagarti/Wala;
1979-1981) all came from minority ethnic groups.
For reasons related to the ethnic composition of the central core of the
PNDC, however, many in Ghana perceive the party as an Ewe party.
The PNDC has often played on this perception to establish a
stranglehold in the Volta Region, but has done precious little to
improve conditions there even as it has exposed the Ewe to possible
future political backlashes. The Volta Region remains one of the most
underdeveloped in the country even though President Rawlings
consistently received over 90% of the Ewe popular vote in the last two
elections. All the
indications are that the NDC can no longer take the votes of the Volta
Region for granted as the electorate seem to have taken stock of their
predicament. Indeed Victor
Gbeho, the current Foreign Minister, has opted to stand as an
independent parliamentary candidate in the region rather than risk the
ignominy of losing on an NDC ticket.
Despite the ethnic reality in Ghana, however, all the parties have gone
to lengths to push the ethnic question on the political agenda.
All the major parties have made conscious efforts to ethnically
balance their presidential teams, putting ethnicity above substance in
an effort to demonstrate their broad-based and inclusive nature.
By choosing a northern ‘Mahama’ as vice-presidential
candidate to team up with a southern ‘Mensah’ and vice versa, all
that the parties have succeeded in doing is to force the ethnic question
into the psyche of the population even as the parties cancel each other
out in terms of the possible advantages of such policy.
The Pretenders to the Throne
The National Democratic Congress
The NDC enters the campaign with all the advantages of incumbency in the
Third World. Its flag
bearer is Professor John Atta Mills, a technocrat who lectured at the
university and a relative newcomer to the PNDC/NDC fold.
His emergence as presidential candidate was not without its
controversies. Since the
1996 elections, the hierarchy of the NDC has factionalised into ethnic
groups with powerful power brokers at the helm.
Prof. Mills was accused of being a mere front man of the powerful
Fante oligarchy that had coalesced around Kwamena Awhoi of CASHPRO and
Kofi Totobi-Quakyie, the current head of national security.
Disappointment at being passed over and anger at the increasing
influence of newcomers to the bandwagon, influenced the decision by a
group of radicals led by Augustus Tanoh and Kofi Kpordugbe to break away
and form the neo-NDC Reform Party.
Observers point to the fact that, as Vice President of Ghana
after 1996, he chaired the Government’s economic policy unit that saw
the rapid downturn in economic performance and the collapse of the Cedi.
On the eve of the elections, Prof. Mills finds himself afflicted
by the ‘Al Gore’ Syndrome. He
is struggling to convince the electorate that he is his own man; while
he preaches PNDC/NDC continuity in the relative success of the
Government’s economic programme, he is at pains to distance himself
from the distasteful human rights record of the PNDC.
To be on the safe side, Prof. Mills would have to aim at an outright
victory in the first round of the elections, a daunting proposition
given the closeness of the contest between him and Mr. John Kufuor of
the New Patriotic Party. If
the opposition manages to force a second round ballot, all indications
are that he is more likely to lose.
The Opposition
Of all the general elections that have taken place in Ghana since 1992,
December 7 offers by far the best opportunity for the opposition to end
the PNDC/NDC dominance in Ghanaian politics.
Not only does the absence of the imposing figure of Rawlings and
the economic downturn play to their collective advantage, but also they
are better prepared organisationally now than in the last two elections.
The three most dominant opposition parties are the New Patriotic
party led by J.A. Kufuor, the Convention Peoples’s Party led by Prof.
George Hagan (representing the Nkrumah/Danquah traditions) and the
Reform Party led by Augustus Tanoh.
The NPP and CPP are still struggling to overcome their long stay
in the political wilderness. A
generation struggle is on going within them between the Old Guard still
clinging to the leadership and the young and radical activists pushing
up the ranks. The RP is a
break away rebel group from the NDC.
It is hampered by its lack of tradition and the weight of past
PNDC excesses.
The New Patriotic Party
For obvious reasons, John A.
Kufuor of the New Patriotic Party offers the greatest challenge to Atta
Mills. The NPP is the most
financially sound and organizationally prepared among the opposition
parties. Beyond that, it
provides a more clear-cut alternative to the ruling party than any other
opposition party. The NDC
is pursuing an economic policy traditionally associated with the NPP
and, perhaps, doing a better job of it.
With no party vigorously challenging the general direction of
this policy, human rights and the rule of law become the key areas of
policy differences. In
theory at least, this is the forte of the Danquah tradition.
While the NDC stresses the primacy of food, shelter, clothing and
stability as the cornerstone of its human rights policy in its
Manifesto, in the NPP Manifesto, the emphasis is placed on ‘the
enjoyment of human rights to their full and respect for the rule of
law’. The confrontation
between social justice and fundamental human rights will play to the
advantage of the latter, given the abysmal human rights record of the P/ NDC.
So convinced is the NPP of the fact that it won the 1996 elections that,
this time round, it is leaving no stone unturned in a bid to ensure a
transparent ballot. It has
ensured that its observers are present at every polling station and has
led the opposition drive to get the electoral register pruned of the 1.5
million names that the Electoral Commission has confessed to.
As a back up, and dangerously so, the NPP is reported to have
armed its supporters in its strongholds of Ashanti and Brong Ahafo for
any eventuality. Though a
bit colourless, John Kufuor is a tested politician and aggressive
campaigner; he is sure to give John Mills a real run for his money.
On the right of the political spectrum, there remain fears within the
party that the United Ghana Movement led by Charles Wereko-Brobby
might pick damaging votes off the NPP in Ashanti and Eastern Regions.
The Convention People’s Party
The Convention People’s Party
has come a long way since the 1996 elections, with young and
enterprising politicians at the heart of its rebuilding exercise.
The feeling is that, the 7 December elections are coming too soon
for it to make a significant impact.
It is handicapped in a number of ways.
Firstly, the NDC’s internal security arrangements are an
extreme version, and its social policies a bastardisation, of
Nkrumah’s policies. Secondly,
the grassroots support base of the NDC – radical
workers’/students’ leaders, the workers and the rural dwellers –
constitutes the traditional core support of CPP.
Finally, the CPP was the hardest hit of the opposition parties by
the deliberate policy of proliferating and dividing parties that was
orchestrated by key figures within the NDC with traditional affiliations
to the CPP on the eve of the return to constitutional rule in 1992.
The party is still struggling to unite the Nkrumahist camp.
Even today, another lesser party, the People’s National
Convention, also lays claim to Nkrumah’s heritage.
The best that the party may hope for in the coming elections is to pick
up a respectable number of parliamentary seats, particularly in the
Northern and Volta Region. This
will definitely help the rebuilding and reassembling exercise and may
well leave the party as the holder of the balance of power in a hung
parliament.
What is predictable, however, is that the CPP will be the key
beneficiary of any probable decline of the NDC following the exit of
President Rawlings, as it stands to reclaim its core support that
constituted the bedrock of the PNDC regime.
The Reform Party
The Reform Party is essentially a Reject Bloc within the NDC.
It was created by a group of so-called grassroots cadres of the
PNDC regime in the course of the intra-NDC struggles to anoint a
successor to the outgoing President Rawlings.
Its leader, Augustus Tanoh, was rumoured to have been earmarked
as Rawlings’s successor. Annoyed
that the exigencies of big-money politics had pushed them (the spade
workers of the NDC architecture) to the fringes, they quit the party en
bloc, angrily accusing ‘the tribal cabals’ that had coalesced within
the party of infesting the party with corruption and corridor intrigues.
While the party may pick up votes from disgruntled and
disenchanted NDC supporters, its national appeal remains suspect.
Many have accused the leadership of the RP of heading the
structures that perpetrated gross violations of human rights – the
Committees for the Defence of the Revolution.
Others see them as key Beneficiaries of cronyism within the NDC
in the course of the ERP.
The key impact of the RP in the elections will be their role as spoilers
to the NDC. Already,
members of the Party have allegedly been exposing NDC election-rigging
techniques to the opposition and revealing the extent of corruption
within the party. It is
doubtful that the RP will last in its present form, raising the
likelihood that it would merge with the CPP in the future.
The Parliamentary Elections
If the presidentials are too close to call, the concurrent parliamentary
elections are even more so. For
parties, such as the CPP and RP, gains in the legislative elections are
the surest base from which they can consolidate.
Ghana is likely to see tactical balloting pacts among the
opposition in a bid to maximise opposition representation in parliament.
From all indications, a parliament where no single party commands
a clear majority will be the outcome.
Such a scenario promises few advantages but could cripple
democratic consolidation. The
lack of a clear majority for any party reduces the threat of
constitutional dictatorship and helps build the culture of consensus.
However, a hung parliament may create a gridlock situation and
block the passing of vital legislation, and legislative paralysis is not
the best option for a society emerging from the shadows of long
autocratic rule.
VII.
Looking Beyond the Elections
The
December 7 elections in Ghana are the most significant political
development in Ghana for 21 years, and for a simple reason: President
Jerry John Rawlings. Though
Ghana has held two multi-party elections since 1992, Ghanaians still
associate the rule in Ghana with the military.
The exit of Rawlings therefore constitutes a paradigm shift in
this respect. The prospects
for consolidation in the democratisation process hinge on the outcome,
and the reactions of winners and losers, to the outcome.
It is therefore surprising that, given the turmoil in the West
African sub-region, the international community has exhibited a low-key
attitude to the exercise.
Reconciliation and Justice
In spite of the progress made in Ghana in the fields of consensus
building and keeping the peace, many unresolved issues remain.
Top of the list is the prevailing attitude in society towards the
issues of reconciliation and justice.
As pointed out, the modest achievements in Ghana have come at a
high price. Massive human
right abuses, probably the worst in the country’s history, impunity
and corruption occurred under the leadership of Flt. Lt. (Rtd.)
Rawlings, his wife – Nana Konadu Rawlings- and several other PNDC
apparatchiks past and present, such as Capt. (Rtd.) Kojo Tsikata, a
cousin to the President and the architect of Ghana’s monstrous
security apparatus. While a
section of the community is struggling to forgive, the other half is
bent on revenge.
Even in the event of an opposition victory, certain pertinent questions
need to be posed. Is it
possible to opt for justice over reconciliation in the immediate
aftermath of the elections? What
would be the attitude of the targets of any inquisition in the
situation, where the accused still mans the security apparatus?
It behoves on the international community, civil society within Ghana
and all the political parties to impress upon the society the need to
temper justice with the overriding concern for consensus building and
sustainable peace. It is
most important that all contesting parties and individuals, as well as
their supporters, play by the rules.
Defeat may be bitter, but the losers must accept the verdict of
the electorate, once a general consensus emerges on the fairness and
transparency of the process. The
authorities responsible for the conduct of the elections need to act
with urgency in releasing results and handling any possible complaints.
For the parties, duty demands that they make the quickest
possible transition from the pre-election bitterness and animosity to
post-election co-operation among opposing parties with the sole purpose
of making the democratic experiment work.
As the parties face the electorate, they should remember that
incompetence on the part of the ruling party and the
‘oppose-anything’ mentality of the opposition contributed to the
failure of the of the democratic experiments of 1969 and 1979.
It would be desirable, therefore, if all political parties gave
serious thought to a movement towards post-Election Unity Government.
Once the co-operation is achieved, the two most pressing items on the
agenda of any new dispensation should be economic stabilisation and
democratic consolidation.
Economic Stability
For there to be any chance of consolidating the democratic process, it
is imperative that the new regime halts economic decline, stabilises the
free-falling Cedi and strengthens policies aimed at weeding out
corruption.
Democratic Consolidation
There will also be the need to take immediate steps to strengthen
democratic governance and the rule of law through constitutional reform.
It would be counter-productive to start the constitutional reform
process by attacking such controversial clauses as the indemnity
clauses. However, it would
be necessary to examine the Constitution with the view to further
opening up democratic space. Among
areas of primary concern should be the:
Ø
Consolidation of democratic institutions by further strengthening
the independence and responsibility of state bodies and the media.
Ø
Reform of oppressive security structures
Ø
Introducing democratic civilian control over the army and other
security forces.
Ø
Operationalisation of the separation of powers.
Ø
Strengthening local government by freeing District Assemblies
from regime control.
Finally, for reasons related to globalisation and its impact on
peripheral states, no durable economic stability nor democratic
consolidation is possible without contextualising these processes within
the framework of regional integration.
The International Community
The lack of sustainable international support by the affluent states of
the world and the draconian conditionalities that the international
financial institutions place on assistance to Third World countries
willing to embark on deep socioeconomic transformations are a part of
the reason for the implosion of conflicts.
It is hoped that the international community shall not wait till
Ghana joins the instability cycle before it starts scrambling to resolve
preventable conflicts. If
there is a best time to be flexible with assistance and support
democratic consolidation in Ghana, the time is now