Subj: Political and Historical Notes of Correction - Complete Text
Date: 14/01/97
To: Okyeame@mit.edu
CC: E.K. Adu@massey.ac.nz
, Okyeame@AfricaOnline.com

For those interested this is the complete and agglomerated text of the most recent postings to Okyeame.
These were prompted by E.K. Adu's series on " Our Culture of Adhocery"


Brothers and Sisters ,


I have been rudely stirred out of my winter hibernation in by EK Adu's post which began by paraphrasing the Bishop of Kumasi, Kwasi Sarpong.

In a rather rambling piece the writer sought to cast doubt on the role of the Ga in the defeat of the Asante during the Glover War (the Eastern half of the pincer movement which constituted the Sagrenti War upon Kumasi) .

He obviously confuses this with Nsamankow, suggesting that they were mere lackeys of the white man. It appears to me that E.K. Adu is some sort of scientist. He however seems to be repeating the common Ghanaian mistake of people not checking their assumed facts before going public with them.

Now, I am not one to let the guesswork and outright distortion of EK Adu stand unchallenged, and in time probably pass for fact. This debate, as I see it, is essentially about Asante attempts at dominance in Ghana, and the disingenuous efforts to cast the same as the assertion of the rights of all the Akan.

The Akanfo or Akan Concept

It is never been cogently argued who the Akan are, and why that definition should exclude, for instance, the Ga and Ewe who share some Akan traditional institutions and nomenclature. So far the main criteria for Akanness seem to be matrilineality, alleged original or first known settlement at Bono-Techiman, the sharing of common borders and the non-practice circumcision.

As to language for example, many distinct ethnic groups in Central , East and Southern Africa speak mutually intelligible versions of Bantu without being considered one people. Strictly-speaking one becomes an Akan through possession of the female blood. This means that a son of e.g. the Asantehene by a Dagomba woman is not Akan.

In case, you consider this too academic, I can assure you it is the definition adopted by the courts of Ghana in succession to the property of intestate Akans. The venerable John Mensah Sarbah, for instance, wrote that: "Fanti laws and customs apply to all Akans and Fantis and to all persons whose mothers are of Akan and Fanti races" (See JM Sarbah, Fanti Customary Laws, London 1897, p. 15).

It would be interesting to know whether this factor was taken into consideration in compiling statistics in the past on ethnic composition in Ghana. If it wasn't the census-takers must have been in some very gross error indeed. It may further be noticed from the above quote that Sarbah himself appears to make a distinction between Akan or Twi-speakers and the Fanti.

By the above criteria for "Akanness" other peoples in South-eastern Ghana, say, the Gá-Dangme, the Ewe and certain Guan groups could easily create their own ethnic bloc based on the practice of circumcision, patrilineality, migration from the East and historical inter-mingling through settlement on each other's territory.

Such a group could be designated the Boka ("East"), emphasising their origin Eastern origin. Like the Akan they would not all share a common language but would be cohesive and numerically strong enough to polarise Ghana (at least the Southern part of it) along an Akanfo/Boka faultline.

Development of the Akan Concept

Reference has been made on Okyeame to the influence of Fanti "philosophers" to the development of Southern Ghanaian, specifically Akan, culture. The term Akan was actually introduced by John Mensah Sarbah, Kobina Sekyi, J.E.Casely-Hayford, J.B. Danquah, etc., deriving it from the term "Akanfo" of which "Akan" is the anglicised version.

A 1629 map reproduced in John Bosman's A New and Accurate Description of the Coast of Guinea, London 1967 reprint (plate opposite p. 1), shows that Akan was actually one of a number of small states in what is now Southern Ghana.Questions of common origin and the like, as considered by the early native intellectuals, were at best guesswork.

JB Danquah, for instance, suggested that the Akanfo originated in Mali, arguing that they were the builders of the ancient Ghana empire, and therefore succeeding in his argument that the Gold Coast should be re-named Ghana. In fact, the ancient Muslim empire of Mali had nothing to do with any of the peoples of present-day Ghana; the Mandingo and kindred peoples were the known builders of the Ghana empire.

If anything, it was the serendipitous lumping together of various native groups of uncertain origin within the forests of Southern and Middle Ghana which provided the beginnings of a common culture as well as a lingua franca in the form of a common trading language, Twi. Much of what is today depicted as being distinctly Asante culture, for instance, derived from things introduced by the Portuguese - for instance the carrying of notables in palanquins, the art of weaving, goldsmithery, deathmasks, etc.

There is no common history of unity, the dominant factor in defining a people, to link the Asante to the other Akanfo. Further, day-names, such as Kofi, Kwame and their variations are so widely spread over Southern Ghana, Southern Togo, Southern Ivory Coast (e.g. Kojo (Ga), Kwadwo (Asante/Fanti) and Kodjo (Ewe)) that it would be absurd to suggest that they should constitute the basis of a common identity for only Akanfo peoples.

There is evidence that the practice of chiefs sitting on stools was long practised in the kingdom of Benin with which the Ga and Ewe have been associated during their migrations. Also, history tells us that long before the Asante allegedly conjured and worshipped a stool out of the skies (believe it if you wish; as far as I am concerned it is utter mumbo-jumbo) (approximately 1700) the Ga stool had been sent by Ga royal migrants, the present-day Gé or Genyi of Anecho in Togo.

Even more crucially, the Akwamu whose emergence really bequeathed the Asante with notions of statecraft, learnt the art of government from the Ga; they sent their princes to the court of King Okaikoi. The contention that the Asante and allied peoples taught the rest of Ghana the art of chiefship is therefore of dubious validity.

But perhaps the greatest evidence of the meaninglessness of the Akanfo concept is Asante tendency to go it alone, play mischief with the term, and lord or attempt to lord it over other Akanfo. For the Asante, the term "Akan" is no more than a tool of convenience to be used in furtherance of their majoritarian claims and covert aims and aspirations. Herein lies the justification of the baseless claims by some Ghanaian politicians and journalists that Akans constitute over 60 per cent of Ghana's population. I wouldn't put it past those who repeat this lie to massage population figures in Ghana at the least opportunity.   

Asante wars of aggression upon the Akanfo

Worse, Asante wars of aggression, waged mainly against other Akan at the least excuse shatters any notion of the Asante ever realistically spearheading a drive for Akanfo unity. Please refer to the statement of Bowdich (Mission from Cape Coast Castle to Ashantee, London 1918, page 4): "Few [Fantis] were slain in battle, for they rarely dared to encounter the invaders; but the butcheries in cold blood were incredible, and thousands were dragged into the interior to be sacrificed to the superstitions of the conquerors."

Now, one presumably Asante contributor on Okyeame has suggested that he has a pint of Polish blood in his veins. If he truly has Polish blood in his veins he must have heard of German reparations and compensation to the Poles and others, including the loss of German territory to both Poland and Russia.

Would he support a demand for reparations to the Fanti? Here's the rub. So long as the Asante pretend that others are unaware of their atrocities and dress the same up as acts of bravery and heroism they are bound to annoy many.

Let them be reminded afresh that those wars of aggression involved the murder, maiming, looting, pillaging, theft, arson, and other barbarous cruelties to other peoples. It is all very well for Asante historians and bigots to beat their breasts over this, but others are not amused by this undisguised celebration of criminality.

There is nothing extraordinary about bravery. As one with active military combat experience ( I fought in the British army in Cyprus and was decorated ) I should know.
Bravery depends of psychosocial factors as well as motivation. Hence the concerns of generals the world over with morale and discipline within the ranks. Superstition, such as Okomfo Anokye created in Asante, has always been a principal factor in the fighting quality of African troops. Take the current conflict in Liberia. Unfounded belief in immunity from bullets has sent countless young men dying; the same applied to the Mau Mau and others.

The Asante had only to make men swear the "ntam kesie miensa", the "oath of Memienda (?) or whatever oath was appropriate and apply the necessary rituals to raise their fighting quality. if it is argued that the Asante were of the same origin, being Akanfo, as the Akwapim it becomes nonsense to argue that the Asante are inherently any braver than other Akan. The literature on coups in Ghana as well as the records of trials of coup-makers provide an interesting sub-text on superstitious and black magic influence on coup-making.


Adu Boahen- the High priest of Asante Supremacy

Will you please stand up Professor Albert Adu Boahen?

This apparently charming gentleman has done more than most to continually remind Ghanaian children of the deeds of the Asante. Indeed he has gone as far as to create the term "Asante empire" and by merely superimposing his own whimsical map on the map of Ghana, done more than his ancestors ever did on the field of battle to "conquer" the people of Southern Ghana for the "Asante empire". He has created the myth that all Southern Ghanaians were Asante subjects.

Any wonder that the Asante are today emboldened into making exclusive claims for leadership in Ghana. The reality is the diametrical opposite.

The idea of empire has never been native to Ghana. Suggestions of empire indicate a detailed administrative and control system as existed in, for instance, Judea under the Romans or as obtained in the Gold Coast under the British when various governors and subordinate officials kept subject peoples in check. It involved a standing army and corp of administrators that run the various localities.

Forget Boahen !

Did the Asante ever devise the administrative and military know-how to operate such a system? Does the writ of even the government of Ghana run effectively in all parts of the country?

Although Prof Boahen writes as an intellectual complete with the weight of authority that a PhD attaches to one's name his books, and therefore his claims, are hardly ever footnooted .

NB: (See for example, AA Boahen, Topics in West African History, London 1966;
JB Webster & AA Boahen, The Revolutionary Years - West Africa Since 1800, London 1967, p. 123 - a map showing an Asante empire larger than the territorial extent of modern Ghana).

This affords him the freedom of extensively embroidering on Ghana history, and indulging in creative historiography of the lowest order. He claimed at p. 77 of Topics in West African History that the Asante conquered the Ga.

When did this happen and at what battle or in what circumstances? What lasting effects did Asante conquest leave on the Ga?

In the same vein Boahen and his like have curiously avoided discussion of the Asante defeat by the Ga at the Battle of Katamanso, another Asante war of aggression for which they paid dearly.

Ever heard of the Dodowa forest? Yes, it has become a Ghanaian version of Waterloo. I understand that in Twi "Kata-manso" means that which is to be covered up. Alternately, when Boahen has been compelled to briefly touch on the Battle of Katamanso or Dodowa, he casts it as a battle between the Asante and the white man. In my estimation this standpoint only demonstrates Boahen's contempt for the ability of non-Asante peoples in Ghana.

Yes, the Ga fought with the British during the Sagrenti War (not Nsamankow as stated by EK Adu), but their role here is also is obscured by Boahen who dismissed the Eastern campaign under Captain John Glover, and emphasises the Eastern campaign through Fantiland as unwarranted breach of Asante territorial integrity.

The accounts show that for the Ga the Eastern campaign was another Katamanso; the records are replete with Ga rejection of Captain John Glover's leadership. In fact, they refused to proceed to Kumasi, restricting their campaign to a storming of Duffo island and the expulsion of the resident Asante and Akwamu garrison. There was no suggestion that the Ga fought as British lackeys.

The Defeat of Asante at Katamanso

Let us examine the facts about the Katamanso routing of the Asante for ourselves. It was stated by none other than John Mensah Sarbah ( Fanti National Constitution (1968 reprint, page 81):
"Some writers say that by this treaty the local rulers acknowledged British protection, but the same writers forget that the defeat suffered by the Asanti sovereign and his forces five years previously, at the battle of Dodowa, in 1826, was inflicted by the natives; for although the use of rockets and grapes turned the scale at the critical moment, there were not more than sixty white soldiers present in a force of 11,380 men."

Europeans may over-state their exploits in Africa as they wish, but it is far more likely that their arms had little effect on the Asante combatants who were already mixed with the Ga and were engaged in bitter hand to hand fighting.

It should be emphasised, since EK Adu seems to suggest that the Ga were mere footsoldiers in a white army that the Gold Coast was colonised in the 1870s and that at the time (1826) the Ga were mainly living territory designated a Dutch sphere of influence. The Ga monarch at Katamanso was therefore not under British command no matter what British writers may say to the contrary. 



The Asante New Patriotic Party and distribution of Ghana's urban population

Brothers and Sisters ,

Let's call a spade a spade !

We should on current evidence be calling the NPP the Asante New Patriotic Party. The Party's antecedents and the various shapes and forms it had taken in the past show up only one element - the leadership is virtually an Asante preserve, or in the case of Busia, it was headed by an Asante puppet.  

EK Adu also questions the validity of the assertion by that the Greater Accra Region is well on its to becoming the most populous region in Ghana; and describes the Asante army as Kotoko. Actually if the election results are anything to go by Greater Accra should already be Ghana's most populous region.

I consider the election returns far more convincing than those collected by census officers. Firstly, census figures are merely based on the say-so of heads or representatives of households.

Second, the voters register, as is well known, often contains many ghost names equally because the figures were based on the say-so of household heads/representatives. But the use of indelible ink, the vigilance of election officers and other factors minimise the risks of double voting.

Furthermore, considering that the bulk of Ghana's population is under 15 years of age and further taking into account superior health facilities in Accra, the trend clearly indicates a more accelerated population growth in the Greater Accra region. Already, Tema has quietly become the country's third largest city.

The argument put forward in the posting by Addy, which E.K. says can be dismissed, omitted the result of the poll in Ga South which was one of the last five results to be declared. Check your election figures again and this unpalatable fact will stare you in the face, and probably haunt for sometime. But it shouldn't.

As you ( E.K.) rightly argued, Accra is cosmopolitan and parliamentary representation in Accra increasingly reflects this. Asante was the most populous region prior to the last election; it was also the most ethnically diverse after Accra.

Yet check the list of parliamentary candidates for the Asante New Patriotic Party. Each and every NPP candidate for Asante was an Asante. Go back to the Accra list and you will see many non-Gas who are today in parliament.

The Ga welcome this trend, but we say that the Asante do the same the NPP has no moral right to put people like Kwamina Bartels as candidates for Accra (even Kwame Pianim was to have stood in Ayawaso) if its Asante leaders refuse to let non-Asantes run in their region.

Adu has unwittingly revealed that Kotoko (not the Asante warriors), the team of which the Asantehene is Chief Patron is nothing but an embodiment of Asante tribal aspirations and perceived glories.

Again, check the Ghana premier football league to see if any other ethnic group does the same, giving a mere football team that reflects perceived tribal glories.
By the way, the Asantes had another team called Great Ashantis. They also have the tabloids "Asante Pioneer" and "Asante Independent" to promote Asante interests and formulate an Asante national agenda.

Can you imagine a newspaper called "Ewe Pioneer" without the Ewes being demonised?

The quest for national unity and progress demands that we do think on these things !

Subj: An Open Letter to the Asante Federalists
Date: 14/01/97  09:25:22
From: Ganyobi
To: E.K.Adu@massey.ac.nz, Okyeame@mit.edu
CC: Okyeame@serengeti.africaonline.com

To the Asante Federalists



The Old Asante Argument for Federalism



Once again there is Asante talk of federalism, symptomatic of their all or nothing approach. This is based on an unsubstantiated claim of ethnic discrimination; but the Asante have been among the most prominent beneficiaries of the Rawlings administration.

Take the Ga by comparison. The last Rawlings government had only one Ga minister, Harry Sawyerr; there was also one Dangme, ET Mensah, a non-cabinet minister. There is no Ga in today's Supreme Court, etc, etc. Yet have the Ga claimed any ethnic discrimination? Nor can favouritism in the Rawlings administration be said to have been solely for the benefit of Ewes.

There are more Kwaminas, Atos and Ebos in the Castle than can be counted, besides, Arkaah (ex Vice President), JEA Mills, and Rawlings' support for Kofi Annan. Here in the U.S. ,Spio-Garbrah is ensconced in the Embassy in Washington and Hayford is acting as High Commissioner in London in succession to the late Kenneth Dadzie.

The Asantes should take a leaf out of the book of the Fantis - Confrontation takes you nowhere ! Lobbying and other operations from within a regime are a surer way of changing its direction. Were Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin not members of the Communist Party of Russia?   

Aside from Ewe over-representation in the military it is possible the Ewe spectre has been over-played. Where are the businessmen and political high-flyers? Some have become so blinded by prejudice that there has been talk on Okyeame of discrimination in favour of Ewes even during Nkrumah's era. How could that have been when Ewes were not in charge of national government?

A dispassionate glance at the composition of past governments, on the other hand, suggest Ewe under-representation.

One remembers only Gbedemah and Goka in Nkrumah's government; no Ewe in Busia's government; and no prominent Ewe in Limann's. You may link Ewe disaffection with the political process with this pattern if you may. Even if it is argued that the Ewes dominate the present regime, their strategy must be based on a very myopic calculation; for I do not foresee another Ewe replacing Rawlings.

In the long run, like other ethnic groups the Ewe are a minority and need alliances lest their perceived gains be wiped out at some point. But I would bet my bottom dollar that Ghanaians as usual would vote against people who pursue only their own interests in national affairs.

The Busia regime expelled many aliens only to grant loans to party favourites and fellow tribalists to take over their businesses. Ghana Commercial Bank loan records show that in some cases borrower's addresses were not even kept on file. After the expulsion of the Greek owners of Panbros, the saltmakers, a cloak and dagger takeover of their Sakumo lagoon-based business in Accra was negotiated on behalf of Appenteng without the necessity of a public bid; all this by Oxford trained academics.

Much has been made ( by obvious Asante/NPP apologists) of Asante hostility to Acheampong and opposition to his Unigov concept; this was because he upset the Busia and Asante applecart. Perhaps the Asantes were right as Acheampong's treachery snatched power from them to this day. As a mere Asante puppet (who thought of himself as an Asante and happily described himself as such in his books) he would have been pushed out by such young Turks as Victor Owusu, Safo Adu, etc.

We must never lose sight of the fact of these and many others besides were of the very first generation of educated Asantes; as time unfolds we should expect their progeny to become even more assertive and hungry for power in Ghana.  

This talk of federalism is based, at least implicitly, in a disparity of natural resources. But Asante is no longer the leading producer of cocoa, and majority shares in its gold mines are held by non-Ghanaians. Nor can revenues from gold mines be guaranteed forever.

The Ga and others have reconciled themselves to sharing the resources and land with others, even non-Ghanaians, and that is just as well; for the facts tell us that the original inhabitants of our homeland and arguably the ultimate owners of all its wealth are neither Ewe, Asante, Dagomba, etc. but the Guans.

All this, of course, is out of the question for the Asante who, as in pre-colonial and colonial times, now regard themselves as the greatest centrifugal force in Ghanaian politics and national unity.

Presidential candidates in the Asante NPP are considered on the basis of "Asanteness" and all others are trampled underfoot. Why should I want to see such a party in power?

I want to see Rawlings out, and also I wish to see greater assertiveness of non-Asantes in the NPP to enable it earn its name as the Ghana New Patriotic Party.



Buchi Akoto's Flawed Arguments for Federalism



Akoto stated that the Asante Youth Association had in the 1980s demanded secession as a way of resolving alleged discrimination against the Asante.

Let us take the Asante and the Ga as two distinct Ghanaian peoples with a stake in the national system and equally entitled to expect equality of treatment from government.

First, the Asante receive royalty on their gold mines (a form of exploitation of land); the Ga receive nothing from government for appropriated land now being utilised by all Ghanaians.

Second, the government removed the University of Science and Technology (first established on the Western compound of Achimota School) to Kumasi; the Ga saw no discrimination in this.

Third, There is only one Ga minister in the present Rawlings regime (Harry Sawyerr); there are many Asantes.

Fourth, the Asante-hene creates and celebrates a silver jubilee, and government and dignitaries pump money into Asante state coffers; the Ga Manche (enstooled in 1965) makes no such demands on government.

Fifth, the core Ga are deprived of practically all their land; the Asantehene establishes a Lands Department and insists on retention of lands within the Asante polity.

Finally, a succession of Asantes, with the blessing of Manhyia Palace, gun for political leadership in Ghana; the Ga have virtually been excluded from leadership positions in post-independence Ghana.

From the foregoing, it is anyone's guess who should be crying foul.

Rather, the Asante, in their apparent contempt for other Ghanaians, whom they ridiculously seem only to regard as their inferiors cry foul and talk about federalism and secession.

If Akoto had really been to Nigeria he should have observed at close quarters the consequences of that tragic country's flirtation with federalism. The defects in the Nigerian federal system cannot easily be encapsulated.

Suffice it to say that for any cerebral Ghanaian a cursory reading of Chinua Achebe's
"The Trouble with Nigeria"  and Wole Soyinka's extensive strictures against his own country, ought to concentrate our minds on the defects of a political system which has created a world-renowned kleptocracy and seen the mushrooming of unviable universities and the siphoning of state wealth into European bank accounts.

In other words, federal Nigeria with all its enormous resources, is a metaphor for the failure of government in Africa; it also provides a recipe for the sort of ethnic bonfire some would, perhaps, wish to see in Ghana if they don't have their way.

It defies belief that any Ghanaian should suggest such a model for our country on a platform such as this.

Could anyone amongst us take such a trip into the realms of unreality? 



Brothers and sisters ,



Majoritarianism and Proportional Representation



As should be obvious to any serious thinkers about Ghanaian politics the central issues about our political future ought to centre of whether the first past the post system of representation as presently obtains in our country really results in the best form of parliamentary representation.

A passing knowledge of the calibre of the present crop of MPs should raise the question whether it is really in our interests that sundry men and women of proven talent should remain outside the political system.

Further, if one takes a micro view of our ethnic groups one wonders how many of the smaller ones are represented in parliament.

What about an Asante who permanently supplants his or herself to Accra. Should his or descendants not be entitled to represent their adopted locality in parliament?

Why should Accra's growing population worry others? Proportional representation provides an answer to each of these questions.

Extended to cabinet level it would be a panacea to many of the gripes expressed on Okyeame. Germany,  and many other democratic countries have adopted the system of proportional representation. Here in the U.S., it is widely acknowledged that the quality of legislation, and consequently of national governance, depends on the quality of legislators.

Properly adapted, proportional representation could ensure representation from the professional and chiefly classes, giving everyone a stake in the system, not simply the garrulous and the cloak and dagger politicians that infest the corridors of power. I can guarantee that unbridled majoritarianism can only lead to a new round of coups.

Indeed, the claim for Akan majority status in Ghana and the consequent annoyance of other elements of Ghana's population is based on the perception that an Akan majority implies a demand that Akans should rule Ghana under any democratic or other system. It is a most shameless substitution of a lie for a fact.

Since EK Adu started his post by paraphrasing Bishop Peter Sapong I will end by referring to the same individual. I allude specifically to his work "Ghana in Retrospect", Accra 1974, Page 20.

There EK Adu will find an account of Okomfo Anokye's alleged struggle with death and attempt to return from the Dead with an eternal cure for death. Remember the story? Anokye said he would return with a cure if nobody cried several days after his own death. Needless to say, he failed to deliver the goods.

As the thrust of the rest of EK Adu's post refers to the need for rationality for development in Ghana, I would simply say that the propagation of irrational stories like Anokye's duel with death and unquestioning mass belief by the Asante in an object allegedly produced out of the empty sky by the same individual can only be based on ignorance, and collectively lead the believers into unrealistic aspirations and the making of unjustifiable claims. 


Long live Ghana !


Numo Notse Amartey
Onukpa Kwei