Peep Sierra Leone

When he arrived in London in 1945, Kwame Nkrumah was barely 36. He had been influenced at Achimota by the teachings of the late Aggrey of Africa, a U.S. trained educator who had stressed equality of the races. His time at Lincoln University had been spent profitably. Although not openly political, he had helped found the African Students Association of North America and had come in contact with Nigerian students who were anti-colonialist and were agitating for independence (Mbadiwe et al).

He had also been influenced by the African nationalist views of the late Marcus Mosiah Garvey. He said until the end of his life, that the 'Philosophy And Opinions of Marcus Garvey' was the book that had influenced him more than any other.

Nkrumah also met the socialist agitator CLR James from whom he said he learned the basics of conspirational organization'.

Nkrumah was to meet another African born in the Caribbean who was to become his lifelong mentor. George Padmore recruited him to the African Services Bureau which agitated for Africa's Independence. The Bureau was the prime organizer of the 5th Pan African Congress held in Manchester in 1945.

That Congress, comprised partly of visiting African trade unionists and students drew up a declaration calling for a ‘Programme of Positive Action' to achieve rapid decolonization. Kwame Nkrumah served as political co-secretary. There he met the late Akunna Wallace Johnson, another radical Pan-Africanist from our country Sierra Leone. Nkrumah than dedicated his life to the work of achieving freedom from colonial rule.

In 1947 the United Gold Coast Convention invited Kwame Nkrumah home to help organize the movement. It was a conservative movement founded by the elite in the cocoa producing Ashanti region of Ghana. It seemed completely out of tune with Nkrumah's growing socialist orientation. Indeed Nkrumah thought long and hard before leaving London to join the UGCC. But it was his conviction that he must use any means to free his home country.

He was always prepared to compromise and work with reactionaries to achieve his objectives.

Nkrumah set out his vision in his first book 'Towards Colonial Freedom' which he published in 1947. In December 1947, he returned to Accra by ship.

He became a dynamic secretary general traveling all over the country to organize the people in pursuit of independence.

After the Second World War had ended, some 65,000 Gold Coast soldiers who had fought as members of the British Armed forces returned home. The experience abroad of these ex-servicemen in fighting fascism had broadened their political outlook, and opened their eyes to the injustices of the colonial system.

They therefore became a potential force in the anti-colonial movement, Nkrumah and Danquah spoke at a meeting of ex-servicemen at the Palladium Cinema in Accra on 20th February 1948. A petition was drawn up to be presented to the Governor expressing their grievances. The ex-servicemen who had returned from the Second World War with high expectations demanded the benefits which had been promised to them during the war, and assistance in finding work.

On 28th February, the ex-servicemen's march set off to present their petition to the Governor. It was originally intended to go to the Secretariat offices. But instead the procession took the road to Christianborg Caste, the Governor's residence.  After the marchers refused to halt when they were asked to do so by the armed police which barred the road, the police opened fire. Three ex-servicemen were killed and many others injured.

The infuriated marchers then turned back to the centre of Accra to join angry crowds out in the streets protesting at the failure of European merchants to lower their prices enough to meet the needs of the people.

News of the shooting of the ex-servicemen sparked off days of rioting, shops and offices of foreigners were attacked. Cars wee set on fire. Shops looted. The violence spread to many parts of the country.

Faced with widespread disorder, Governor Sir Gerald Creasey declared a state of emergency and troops were called out to restore order in Accra. Later, Kwame Nkrumah and five other members of the UGCC, considered as trouble makers, were arrested.

Nkrumah was blamed by other members of the Big Six when they appeared before the Watson Commission, set up to look into the Accra disturbance.  They began to dub him a 'communist' and a' radical'.

Kwame Nkrumah became convinced that the time had come to break with the UGCC and form his own party. They objected to his founding of the Ghana College, established by him to accommodate pupils who had been expelled from schools because they went on strike in support of the Big Six when they were detained in the Northern Territories. Nkrumah had managed to hire a hall in Cape Coast to accommodate the students. The three teachers with whom the college started had lost their jobs for the same reason as their students.

These teachers agreed to work for no pay until the college finances were on a sound basis. Nkrumah himself contributed ten pounds of his twenty-five pounds monthly salary to purchase basic equipment.

Nkrumah finally broke with the UGCC over the question of organizing the youth. The Big Five frowned on the Committee on Youth Organization (CYO) which became the UGCC' youth wing'.

The conservatives opposed the move and eventually decided Nkrumah should be expelled from the UGCC.

On June 12, 1949, the CYO became the Convention Peoples Party with Nkrumah as its leader. He then began to push the slogan 'Self Government Now!' in distinction to the UGCC which was prepared to 'negotiate' Freedom at some later date.

On January 8, 1950 the CPP began a Positive Action Campaign of strikes, boycotts and peaceful mass action to persuade the British colonialists to hand over power to the African majority. He was arrested and detained.

While in prison, elections were held under the new constitution recommended by the Watson Commission the CPP won 34 out of 58 seats and Kwame Nkrumah, still in detention, won Accra Central with 27,780 votes out of a total of 22,780 votes out of a total of 23,12 - the highest vote ever recorded in Ghana's history (remember this was an election organized by the British colonialists!)

On February 12, 1951 Nkrumah was released from prison and next day invited to form the government.

On that same day he held a press conference to announce that the British-imposed Cousey constitution would only be a 'stepping stone to independence'.

He promised to resume the 'Positive Action campaign' if the British did not accept a parliamentary motion for 'Self Government Now!' and on July 10, 1953 he introduced the 'Motion of Destiny' to make Ghana fully self-governing. The British insisted on another election. The CPP won this with 72 out of 104 seats in the Legislative Assembly. The UGCC, now renamed the National Liberation Movement, did all it could to frustrate and delay Nkrumah's plans for independence. On May 15, 1956, the Legislative Assembly passed a motion calling for the British to leave the sovereign state of Ghana. It was passed on June 5, 1956. The British insisted on yet another election which the CPP again won.

Unlike the NLM, the CPP won seats throughout the country as a whole, and was the only Party which could claim to speak in a national sense.

Even in Ashanti, then the stronghold of the NLM, the CPP won 8 out of the 21 seats and received43% of the votes cast, an increase on the previous election.

The opposition opposed the Bill declaring Ghana a sovereign and independent state within the Commonwealth. They were detested by a majority of 77 votes. They then sent a delegation to London led by Dr. Kofi Busia.

Busia, who led the opposition delegation to London, actually appealed to the British government not to grant independence. He said the country was not ready for it: "we still need you (the British) in the Gold Coast".

He found some support among sections of the British press, but there could be no denying that the conditions laid down by the Secretary of State, that Nkrumah's motion for independence should be passed by "a reasonable majority in the newly elected Legislature", had been satisfied, and at long last a date for independence was fixed for 6th March 1957. On November 20, 1956, the NLM sent a separate resolution to the British demanding independence for Asante and the Northern Territories. But that became untenable and Ghana became independent on March 6, 1957.