There
are countless examples across Africa of how misguided and power hungry
politicians and other public office holders played the ethnic card in a bid to wrestle
power and how those irrational acts decimated their own nations.
Rwanda
is perhaps the best example but so is Kenya after the 2007 elections in which
up to 1,500 people died from ethnic clashes. Even the Ivorian war was in part
ethnically executed.
It’s
against this backdrop that I find a pronouncement by Ghana’s caretaker President, John Mahama, who
is seeking to retain power during the country’s December 7, 2012 elections most
offensive.
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| President Mahama |
Addressing the chiefs and people of Nankpanduri in northern Ghana during a campaign tour
of the Northern Region this week, the President of one of Africa’s brightest
democracies, seemed to appeal for their votes – not so much based on his vision,
policies and the record of the ruling party but – simply because of where he
comes from, the Northern Region. The bait to his ethnic cleavage, his kith and
kin, is not only Machiavellian but also obnoxious.
Ironically,
three of the four candidates that participated in the IEA presidential debate last
Friday are from the northern half of the country but I don’t quite think that
Ghanaians were bothered by that as much as the vision, policies and ideas they
espoused on that platform.
With that
unguarded statement, President Mahama has doubtlessly and quite deliberately so,
drawn many Ghanaians away from the policy discourse they are craving for, to their
differences, superficial as they are.
But
Mahama is not alone in playing the ethnic card in this election. His main
opponent, Nana Akuffo Addo in this election, a few months ago also made an
ethnically charged statement trying to distinguish his Akan ethnic group from
other ethnic groups in the country.
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| Nana Addo |
The
PPP’s Paa Kwesi Nduom has also made some ethnically charged in his recent
campaigns. In a campaign stump speech a week ago in Cape Coast, capital of the
Central Region, Nduom urged his supporters to ignore ‘Adze wo fie oye’ (understood to be a reference to the vice
president Paa Kwesi Amissah Arthur who is also from Cape Coast) and adopt ‘Adze papa wo fie oye’.
Nduom
reframed his statement by urging his supporters: ‘Don’t just vote for a Fanti,
but a Ghanaian who is competent….’ But by the time Nduom reframed his message
the harm had possibly been done.
Ghana
certainly deserves better. There are over 10 major ethnic groups in Ghana with
many more sub-regroups.
Ethnicity in African politics really is more top down than most like to admit. It is unfortunate that these candidates have not been condemned enough for these statements. This is really far more insulting than all the talk about the 'politics of insults'.
ReplyDeleteIn fact people should lose their positions in parties over this. But I dont think it will happen until there has been mass mobilization within organisations that make it a point to fight against this divisive politics.
ReplyDeleteSo what is the point being made? people should deny their ethnic backgrounds?
ReplyDeleteWhat is there to condemn about anyone identifying with his people merely?
The only person among all the three who made statements that need condemnation is Nana Addo. Yet your write-up only as a terse mention of his statement.
Let us not confuse the matter. There's nothing wrong with celebrating one's ethnic background and or rallying kith and kin on-board a cause. What is wrong is if ethnicity is exploited for wrong like violence as Nana Addo did which you did not mention specifically. Nana Addo called for violence, claiming his ethnic people are people of courage and indeed equated the whole of the NPP to an akan party. That is what is wrong and needs to be condemned. Not those who merely rally their own people to their side for noble aspirations.
So let's get it clear and not fudge the issue.