Accra, Ghana
We were not long out of the port on our excursions before the relative prosperity of Ghana became apparent compared with some of our recent stops. There were fewer motorcycles and more and newer cars, the latter on roads that were remarkably free of pot-holes. Wealth and Ghana have long been synonymous, the ancient empire of Ghana supplying gold to Europe and the Middle East. In colonial times the region attracted attention for its gold, becoming the British Crown Dependency of the Gold Coast in 1874. By that time this section of the coast was also known for its black gold, as the trade in African slaves was known.
In 1957, the former British colony became the first independent former colony in Africa, taking the ancient name of Ghana and led by Kwame Nkrumah, the celebratory Memorial Park to whom we visited on our morning tour of the nation’s capital, Accra. Nkrumah took upon himself a pan-African role: he was a prime mover behind the Organization for African Unity (OAU), for example, and some historians would argue that he frittered away precious resources in this capacity, including constructing a grandiose headquarters for the OAU in the capital which was never used. Beside the museum was a decapitated statue of the independent country’s first president, testifying to the opposition that deposed him by military coup when he was out of the country in 1966. He died of cancer in exile six years later. As with so many post-independence African rulers, Lord Acton’s dictum that all power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts absolutely comes to mind, as Nkrumah became increasingly intolerant of any opposition to his personal rule. History has been kinder to him than to several others of his contemporaries, however, and significant economic indicators such as agriculture, transport and education saw significant improvement during his years in power.
The city tour was multi-faceted visiting an orphanage, the National Museum of History and Ethnography, a high-quality artisan market as well as a workshop where funeral caskets can be commissioned to reflect the deceased’s occupation, from beer vendor to cinema projectionist. A “Green Trails” option visited the Shai Hills game reserve with good sightings of kobs, the West African antelope. Both tours involved passing through the busy traffic of a vibrant capital city of some three million population.
