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Since the Overthrow of Kwame, we have been treated with various theories to justify his removal from office; Kwame was accused of abusing human rights and undermining civil liberties of every Ghanaian. His economic and social policies were undoubtedly the best our country ever had yet every effort is made to discredit the man whose fame and popularity grows with every generation of Africans.
Ironically, the more Kwame opponents dead and alive try to discredit him, the more they endear him to young and growing Africans. For those of us who knew not this world at the times of Nkrumah but have come to admire him, it is because we have gone beyond the conspiracy theories in Ghana crafted purposely to undermine him in history, to search for alternative answers. Thankfully the real truth is now emerging. Gradually American declassification secret documents would lead to names being mentioned for our objective judgment.
Given that abuse of civil liberties is often cited as the main reason for the overthrow of Nkrumah as seen in among other documents, General Ankrah’s declassified letter to Lyndon Johnson, it is proper to ask, why is Kwame Nkrumah who began as a democrat took such draconic measures to silence opposition to his government?
To begin, we must acknowledge that abuse of civil liberties in whatever form is wrong and condemnable, however, it is equally important to understand the events in Ghana at the time, against the background that several attempts were made at Kwame Nkrumah’s life by some power hungry individuals who eventually became the beneficiaries of his downfall.
It cannot be denied that bombs were thrown at Nkrumah on more than one occasion, and there were both covert and overt plans to undermine his regime and national stability by forces within aided by forces without from the very moment Those who cherish their civil liberties as granted by the state, must know that national leaders who protect ours, also deserve to have their rights and liberties, which when threatened, the response could be catastrophic; this fact is often forgotten when the story of Kwame is told.
One is yet to see any government who failed to responds in like manner or who acted differently, when threatened. In the world today, George Bush who prided himself as the leader of the free world is going down in history as the American President who presided over the worse human right and civil liberty abuses in the world. Thousands of human beings are being held in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guatanamo bay near Cuba and in fact in the US itself, without any lawful trial as a response to the threats posed by Osama Bin Laden and his cohorts. The Patriot Act passed in the US in response to 9/11 is more draconic and dangerous than Kwame Nkrumah’s Preventive Detention Act (PDA); both are simply unacceptable and inhuman.
The Americans who masterminded the overthrow of Nkrumah certainly had motives other that Nkrumah’s perceived or real dictatorship. Their motive was to destroy our young and industrializing nation, as well as demoralize the visions of all independent African states. In fact 24th February is our national day of shame. The documents, declassified at the end of 1999 but recently made public, show that the American government started talking about Nkrumah's overthrow as far back as 6 February 1964 two full years before the actual event when the then secretary of state Dean Rusk and the CIA Director John McCone met and picked the Ghanaian general, J.A. Ankrah, as the man to take over from Nkrumah.
From that meeting, the action snowballed into America recruiting Britain and France to help break the back of Ghana's economy by manipulating it from afar, in order to create disaffection among the Ghanaian people and hasten Nkrumah's downfall.
The declassified American documents show that on 6 February 1964, William C. Trimble, the then director of the State Department's West African desk, wrote a memo entitled ‘Proposed Action Programme for Ghana’to the assistant secretary of state for African affairs, G. Mennen Williams, saying: Although Nkrumah's leftward progress cannot be checked or reversed, it could be slowed down by a well conceived and executed action programme. Measures which we might take against Nkrumah would have to be carefully selected in order not to weaken pro-Western elements in Ghana or adversely affect our prestige and influence elsewhere on the continent’ Trimble continued: ?US pressure, if appropriately applied, could induce a chain reaction, eventually leading to Nkrumah's downfall. Chances of success would be greatly enhanced if the British could be induced to act in concert with us.
“Intensive efforts should be made through psychological warfare and other means to diminish support for Nkrumah within Ghana and nurture the conviction among the Ghanaian people that their country's welfare and independence necessitate his removal. On 12 February 1964, a high-powered American-British meeting on Nkrumah was held at the White House, attended by (on the American side) President Lynden Johnson, Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Under-Secretary of State Harriman, and Special Assistant to the President on National Security Affairs, McGeorge Bundy. On the British side were Prime Minister Douglas-Home and Foreign Secretary Butler. One could not be sure how long Nkrumah would last,? Butler said at the meeting, according to the minutes recently released with the declassified American documents. On 26 February 1964, another meeting on Nkrumah was held at the White House.
Nkrumah’s viewpoint was supported by the former Ivorian president, Felix Houphouet Boigny, in an interview with Paris-based magazine, Jeune Afrique, published on 4 February 1981. He told the magazine: ‘Destabilization is not a new thing. Did you know why Idi Amin made his coup in 1972? It was not he who did it, but the British. He did not even know what he wanted himself. It was the same in Ghana when the military overthrew Nkrumah. They [the Ghanaian coup makers] came to see me. I asked them why. They replied: All is not well any more. Is that all? [I asked them]. I also asked them what they were going to do; they did not know. People outside knew it for them.
On 12 March 1966, less then three weeks after the Ghana coup, Robert W. Komer, the then special assistant to President Johnson on national security, wrote a congratulatory assessment to the president, saying: ?The coup in Ghana is another example of a fortuitous windfall. Nkrumah was doing more to undermine our interests than any other black African. In reaction to his strongly pro-Communist leanings, the new military regime [in Accra] is almost pathetically pro-Western.
Howard Banes who was the CIA station chief in Accra engineered the overthrow of Kwame Nkrumah. Now, obviously, you can look at it in different ways. A Ghanaian might say I thought we did it. Inside the CIA, though, it was quite clear. Howard Banes had a double promotion and an Intelligence Star for having overthrown Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana. The magic of it, what made it so exciting for the CIA, was that Howard Banes had had enough imagination and drive to run the operation without ever documenting what he was doing, and to sweep along his bosses in such a way, that they never knew what he was doing, tacitly they approved, but there wasn’t one shred of paper that he generated that would nail the CIA hierarchy as being responsible. In the late 1960s, Western journalists travelled to Ghana to pick up the bones of Nkrumah’s industrial experiment. Their contentious reports seemed to confirm to the West a new myth of Africa, a continent unable to handle the complex pressures of industrialization.? Immediately following the coup both western journalist and their local agents treated Ghanaians and the world to various theories explaining the Nkrumah’s overthrow. Ghanaians and the world was made to understand that the Kwame wasted our national resources and money on irrelevant national projects like the 12 miles Accra-Tema motorway, the Black Star Square, the Akosombo Dam and the State House among others. Unfortunately, many Ghanaians including our own president, J A. Kufour bought into this theory.
It is ironic and sad to see President Kufour stand on the grounds of the very Black Star Square considered as one of Nkrumah’s waste projects, and repeat his adherence to the Nkrumah-Waste Theory; when he claimed Ghana was rich at independence but all the money was wasted. Mr. President, I beg to defer, as New African** puts it, ?even the most strident opponent of Nkrumah agrees that the Tema Motorway, the State House (or Job 600), and the Black Star Square were no ?white elephant?. They were a necessary part of the national infrastructure that had to be built at one point or another. Today, all parades, big national events and presidential inaugurations, including those of Presidents Hilla Limann (1979), Jerry Rawlings (1992 & 1996), and John Kufuor (2001), are held at the Black Star Square. The Tema Motorway, serving the country’s main in-bound port, is still the best piece of road in the country. Without it, the Tema port will be useless Nkrumah, to come home and work with them. It was the beginning of an incredible twenty year journey which would attain the freedom of Ghana and the beginning of the move towards African Unity (TO BE CONTINUED). |
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