Here’s an excerpt:

A New York City subway train holds 1,200 people. This blog was viewed about 5,300 times in 2011. If it were a NYC subway train, it would take about 4 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

Ade Sawyerr looks to the future for African and Caribbean in Britain.

African and Caribbean people may have followed different routes of migration to Britain and may have different cultural practices but, to all intents and purposes, they are seen by the authorities in this country as one people.

The first generation immigrants tended to form their own community organisations, support and self help groups that advocated and facilitated their settling and integration into the main communities.

These welfare organisations, formed because of the need to survive in an alien environment, provided an identity that still held on to their old way of life in the countries of origin.

The organisations helped supplement what the statutory sector offered in the area of social support – so health groups, housing organisations, supplementary educational agencies, employment and enterprise based as well as arts and leisure based community organisations were set up to cater for the culturally sensitive needs of those earlier immigrants.

The perception that African and Caribbean people underachieve in education and are therefore on the lower rung of the economic ladder, employed at lower levels and on welfare and benefits and parasites on the state gained credence as party leader after party leader blamed immigrations for the economic ills of this country.  Disadvantage, discrimination bad housing, bad education in inner city schools and the inequality in the health and job systems faced by ‘the immigrants’ was never actually dealt with.

However the outlook for black people seems brighter as they begin to excel in different skills areas.  Equal opportunities in the public sector has helped black people to develop careers that were closed to them several years ago; now black people have risen to senior management levels in local authorities, there have been chief officers and there have also been a few chief executives in statutory sector organisations.

Gradually black people are excelling in traditional areas, in law and medicine as they have done in teaching and other areas. Progression has also taken place in the voluntary and community sector, but is yet to gain root in the private sector, certainly not as fast as has happened in the United States of America.

In this regard whilst many have advocated some form of quota system and other mechanisms such as contract compliance to force the issues of a representative work force, even the voluntary targets set by some public sector organisations such as the Home Office had to be abandoned for lack of effective monitoring of the results.

More and more private sector organisations are recognising the benefits of a diverse workforce and in the next 20 years there should be more improvements in the fortunes of black people in the private sector.

But though African and Caribbean people in Britain have come a long way despite years of disadvantage and discrimination and have managed to achieve a measure of success in several fields including politics where there is now a slowly growing number of members in parliament and more peers in the house of lords, the campaign for racial equality needs to be strengthened lest the few gains are lost.

The talk about curbing immigration, the attacks on multiculturalism and the threat of cuts facing most black voluntary and community organisations signal a situation that may further disadvantage black people.  It is as if the system considers that black people have come far enough and now must simply ‘fully integrate’ into the mainstream to end disadvantage.

Many have suggested that maybe we need many more successful businesses that will become a symbol of our success and role models for people to follow.  There is however no suggestion under this scenario that instead of spending their money in conspicuous consumption on materialistic things the money should rather be ‘invested’ in community assets and philanthropic gestures that would help uplift the community

Perhaps what we need here is an effective activist think tank that have horizontal and vertical relationships with all other black organisations, that would play a coordinating role of sorts but that would also come out with research that would influence government policy initiatives but will at the same time be authoritative enough to respond to and comment on government policy.

Fortunately, there are models of what have been achieved in America through having one strategic organisation – the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, (NAACP) that has a relationship with all other black organisations whether they are in education, in the arts, enterprise and business, employment and housing, that all helps to push for advancement.

However, whilst organisations such as these may help to articulate our issues, we also need to re-examine our priorities.  We also need to change the perception of our communities and reject the negative stereotypes levelled at us in this country.  By taking control of our destinies, we need to properly define our objectives and determine what we consider to be success within our communities.

As we look to the future we need to recognise what other organisations such as OBV have done to redress the representation rate of black people not only in politics but in the criminal justice system; we need to recognise and celebrate the positive action programmes that they have implemented that have facilitated entry into varied positions as councillors and magistrates.

Many more of such programmes and mentoring schemes may be needed in education, employment and enterprise to increase the numbers and improve the positions. But we certainly need more campaigning to a refocus of our priorities, we need our community organisations and we need them to focus on creating an air of cohesiveness rather than the fragmentation that we have now.  The old adage of united we stand strong, divided we fail and fall is relevant.

Ade Sawyerr is partner in the diversity and equality focussed consultancy, Equinox Consulting

First published in OBV Magazine at

http://www.equinoxconsulting.net/Articles/obv/vision%20of%20unity.pdf

CPP -The enemy is not within our party, the enemy is out there!

by Ade Sawyerr – London

As an ardent supporter of the Convention Peoples Party, events over the past few months have almost thrown me into a state of despair. But as a firm believer in God, I am confident that these rows are not a foretaste of worse things to come, but rather a test of how strong and resilient the party is even when there is a slugfest in the public arena.

Mine is not to apportion blame as to who started what, or who will win this fight about process in the party, but as a senior comrade of the party, I think I will be failing in my duty, to the party that I so cherish, if I do not pass public comment on the sorry mess that we find ourselves in.

We need to be honest about our fortunes before we can do anything positive that would lead us out of the morass.  Over the past few weeks, I have been avoiding answering my telephone; I have been dodging the incessant questions from well wishers and sympathisers, some of who I have convinced to join the party, who are worried about what is happening and who want to know why we cannot bottle our energies towards the growth and development of the party.

Of course, there are several people, mainly in other parties, who because of the recent state of affairs, are beginning to write us off, but we need to find answers to their claim that we are not serious.  Some of these commentators do not understand why we must squander the goodwill we have generated over the past four years with a spat that has no reason or rhyme.

Four years ago, there was a bright spark in the party as Ladi Nylander emerged as chairman of the party.  He had replaced Dr. Delle, a seasoned politician who had tried so hard to unite the party in the midst of discord.  Dr. Delle was so much aware of why our votes had collapsed in 2004; he had commissioned research that would identify how to allocate resources so that we would attain a respectable showing in the parliamentary and presidential polls in 2004.  He desperately wanted to revive the fortunes of the party but had been held hostage by different factions, the Patriots and the Movement who were fighting for control of the party.  He had to deftly negotiate between these two groups and others who were pulling the party in different directions.

Chairman Ladi Nylander did his best under fire, from a faction of the party, to hold the centre together when rogue elders in the party were ‘cutting their noses to spite their faces’ so to speak, because their favoured candidates had lost the flag bearership at congress. But try as he did, chairman Ladi Nylander failed to unite the factions in the party.  Our poor showing in the 2008 was a reflection of a party that forgot that it was in a contest against other parties and spent most of the time and effort in doing damage to the fortunes of our flagbearer who had won election at congress.  The internal battles were about who was more ideologically sound and who understood Nkrumaism better.  We lost and we did so badly.  We were fighting enemies within the party rather than training what little firepower we had on our opponents; the other political parties inGhana.

We should have learnt the lessons of that loss and worked harder at building the party soon after the 2008 elections, but we did not; we launched into another fight as to why we got only 1.34% of the votes and instead of blaming the party as a whole, some – vociferous faction – decided that it was the fault of the flagbearer.

Though Chairman Ladi did not unite the party, he made the party more respectable; he sustained it for four good years and soldiered on to a successful congress.  Chairman Ladi Nylander needs to be applauded for the sterling work he did in the reconstruction of the party.

Our new Chairman and Leader, Samia Nkrumah has inherited a party that has a history of indiscipline especially from those who do not accept election results.  Those are the people she should be railing against.  Those who do not understand that losing an election can be done gracefully; those who do not understand that you can return stronger if you learn the lessons of your loss; those who refuse to recognise that elections within parties are good things and getting people to step aside in the interest of the party are only denying the competition that creates a buzz in the party and energises the rank and file.

The CPP is riddled with factions and Chairman Leader Samia has to deal with these factions.  The task is more difficult because these factions are spurious and based on neither philosophy nor principles.  The factions are not even based on policies and approaches, but rather on follies of personalities.  In the CPP, anyone who has a different view of how we get ourselves out of the parlous state of the party is accused as a mole, high-jacker, spy, CIA agent, collaborator, traitor, ‘bought’ or whatever unpleasant word that can be used to describe a dissenter.  But the solutions to CPP problems will not come from only one section of the party even if they are in the majority; as a party that prides itself on being a broad church, we should all be working together and tap into the diverse opinions and approaches, and indeed into personalities and different backgrounds for the social, economic and political upliftment of the people of Ghana and Africa.

There should be ideologues as well as non-ideologues; there should be those who support the party for a rational reason as well as those who have an emotional attachment for the party; some born into the party, others recently joined because they believe in the common cause of the party; or, are impressed with one or the other personality in the party.

The CPP will not be revived by chasing enemies inside the party; the internal disagreements will continue but we should ensure that those disagreements lead to convergence of energies and resources to take on the other parties and defeat them at the elections.  All have a role to play in the party and the internal disagreements should not be allowed to overshadow our hunger to restore faith in the eyes of our sympathisers and our well wishers who intend to join us for the battle for the soul of the Ghanaian and African.

This is the time to be passionate ‘fishers of men and women’ for the party.  However, we can only become fishers of men, if we widen and broaden the base of the party.  A party that advocates for the mass of the poor inGhanacannot afford to be narrow; it must include all of the people; it must inspire them in such a way that all will be welcome.

These internal squabbles that find themselves out in the open detract from the powerful message that the CPP should be out there actively propagating to encourage more persons to join and vote for us.  An end to the very public quarrels will help us focus on spreading our message of hope for those who are fed up with the uninspiring politics of the NDC and the NPP –  two parties who are seen as the two sides of the same coin.

We should ask them to come and join our party and vote for as in both the presidential and the parliamentary elections come next year because it is only the CPP that is bold enough to reject the orthodoxy of the multilateral and bilateral institutions that prevent us from development.  We should renew our efforts to let more and more people know that it is only the CPP who will do something about the misery and poverty that the large mass of our people live under and that will actively use the power of the state backed by science and technology to industrialise the country and provide, better education and skills for the mass of the people so that they will increase the productive capacity of the country through the jobs that will be created as a result of our industrial policies.

We must tell the people that through our process of principled approach to community engagement and involvement, we will fashion policies that speak to the people of Ghana and Africa about their health, their education, their jobs, the safety and their environment.  We should be energised to take this message to all the people, to the schools and colleges, to the markets, to the workers and farmers and fisherfolk, to all the vocational workers and artisans, to the common man as well as the professionals.  We the members of the party should be using all the media available to us, by word of mouth, through our benevolent and self help organisations, our churches and mosques, on radio and in print, on television as well as on the internet and on our mobile phones that the Great Red Cockerel is sounding an urgent call to them at the dawn of this century that our task of rebuilding our Ghana and Africa is as urgent now as it was at the time of independence.

It is early days yet for our new leader however we trust that these internal problems will be sorted out and we work on the very basis on which we must fight the next election. We must be energised by the fact of new leadership that will work towards the reconciliation, reconstruction and revival of the party.

We are confident that our Chairman will lead us in this task of taking the message to the people of Ghana and that she will be accompanied by our parliamentary candidates and our flagbearer all singing from the same hymn sheet as we empower the people of Ghana to vote for the only party that will transform our society, our economy and our polities and restore the pride of the Ghanaian and African and prove to the whole world that the black man is capable of running their own affairs.

Our enemy is not within our party; our enemy constitutes the other parties! We need to unite the party and that is the challenge for the leadership!

As we return to normality after this initial rush on the airwaves and the print media, we must be reminded that for any successful endeavour we need the efforts of all as captured in this interpretation of Sun Tzu by Tu Mu

“The skilful employer will employ the wise, the brave, the covetous and the stupid.  For the wise man delights in establishing his merit, the brave like to show their courage in action, the covetous is quick at seizing advantages and the stupid have no fear of death”

Forward ever

Ade SawyerrLondon

by  Ekow Nelson

The overwhelming victory of Samia Nkrumah in the national executive elections at the recent Extraordinary CPP Congress was both an emphatic repudiation of the ‘old guard’ and an affirmation of the deep affection her father Osageyfo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah continues to enjoy among party members. But will this symbolic and substantive shift at the top help restore the fortunes of the CPP and make it a relevant actor in Ghana’s politics?

In my open letter after her victory in the 2008 parliamentary elections, I urged Hon. Samia Nkrumah to do all she could to avoid the charge of having used her constituency as a transit lounge to her leadership ambitions. Over time, I advised, “when you have established yourself as an accomplished member of parliament and legislator, the executive leadership of the party will pass on to you and I hope that like Sonia Ghandi you will help lead the CPP back into power as she did India’s Congress Party. I am sure you can do it but that won’t be for a few years yet.” I wish I could say I was prescient but it is now clear that the party could not wait as long as I had imagined when I wrote that piece.

Having consistently under-performed in the nearly two decades of Ghana’s fourth republic, it is understandable that many sympathizers of the CPP had become desperate and were looking to change course. Her election clearly signals a generational shift – even if she herself is not as young – and may yet lead to a root and branch restructuring of the organisation and management of the CPP and a reshaping of the membership profile.

The main task before the new party Chairman, however, is to make the CPP electable again. The most urgent, in my view, is to persuade the country that the CPP remains relevant in the twenty-first century. She will have to find a convincing answer to the question posed by the likes of the veteran journalist Mr. Gyan-Apenteng and me: “What is the CPP for” in Ghana today? And the answer to this question requires more than mission statements, ideological epithets, or glib references to the party’s achievements over 40 years ago or the seven-year development plan of 1964. The CPP needs a reason to remain a serious contender for power beyond nostalgic references and at the moment it is not clear what that is.

Independence was not Nkrumah’s idea but it became synonymous with the CPP because he made the struggle for it the raison d’être of the party and was successful at persuading majority of the people that only the CPP could deliver where those before him had failed. After independence he repositioned the CPP as the party for development and progress with much success. But what exactly is the CPP for today? Besides the obvious fact that it has existed in some shape or form since 1949, there is a distinct lack of clarity about what the CPP is for and without that clarity and a corpus of true believers it will remain marginal to the politics of the country.

The CPP needs a cause and message around which the people of the country can rally. It needs to connect with the hopes, challenges and aspirations of the people and be believed as a viable alternative. Today, no one believes the CPP to be a serious alternative to the two dominant parties. The party needs ‘believers’ more than polling station registration. But ‘believers’ must have something or someone to believe in and in the last 20 years the party has failed to articulate what that something is.

With the election of Samia Nkrumah as its National Chairman, the CPP has, some will say, played its last and strongest political card yet since 1992. However, if her leadership were to fail to pull the CPP from the margins of Ghanaian politics and transform it into a serious mainstream alternative to the NDC or NPP, the game will truly be up and the party will almost certainly continue its inexorable slide into oblivion. Think about it: if an Nkrumah cannot inspire the CPP to success who else out there can? Who else out there will be shown all that goodwill and granted the benefit of the doubt?

At this most crucial stage of its history the CPP stands either to wither or experience a great resurgence as a serious mainstream political party under the watch of the founder’s daughter. Whether by design or fate Samia Nkrumah finds herself, ominously, at the precipice of history: she can either make the CPP great again or affirm its irrelevance in 21st century Ghana. And while she and her supporters may feel justifiably euphoric for a sweet, sweet victory I am sure she also recognises the enormity of the challenge ahead. Will she be the one that saves her father’s party or has she come to preside over its final rites?

It is this dangerous mix of excitement and fear that should galvanize all those with a deep affection for the CPP to rally around the newly-elected Chairman and help her succeed. Because if she fails, the party fails; we all fail and with that the dreams and hopes of those of us who have wished for a return of the CPP will evaporate forever. The internecine war and vicious sniping from the sidelines must stop. The CPP must get behind its new Chairman, pull together and help restore the party’s fortunes.

But she can’t do it alone and so equally, it is imperative for the newly-elected Chairman to be magnanimous in victory, reach out to her opponents and be inclusive to help heal the deeps wounds in party. She cannot undertake the enormous task alone with only her coterie of supporters and admirers or even the thousand or so delegates who voted for her. She will need every faction and every wing of the party to be successful.

To customise a well-known British expression for the Ghanaian context, “the CPP is drinking in the ‘last chance’ beer bar”. With the election of the daughter of its founder, the party appears to have cast the last die and may have been thrown a lifeline too. It can either grab hold of that lifeline to restore its political fortunes or continue with its penchant for frivolous navel gazing and drown in the sea of electoral irrelevance.

Samia Nkrumah stands between failure and success but the direction of travel will be determined by whether the CPP itself is hungry enough for power, remains disciplined and can persuade the country that it has something uniquely different to offer the people of Ghana as once her father did.

http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/photo.day.php?ID=215437

I’ve just been looking at these pictures ( clink on the link above ) from the Chicago GhanaFest a week or two ago; said to be the biggest pan-Ghanaian cultural festival outside Ghana.

1. new publications in our native languages and English which is by far and will always be our common and most important language ;
2. new products from Ghana such as value-adding processed foods, new garments, in short things which employ people, add value to the economy and give our people a sense of confidence and competitiveness in today’s world of globalisation and fierce economic competition
3. new works of art, music. poetry which will showcase our Ghanaian cultures as indeed dynamic and modern rather than static and stuck in a romanticised and indeed romantic bygone era

President Obama: What a week!

Submitted 3 May 2011 11:08am
in

• News

OBama, ‘one ‘helluva’ of a lucky and smart President’ writes Ekow Nelson.

The former UK Prime Minister Harold Wilson once observed that “a week is a long time in politics”. And what a week it has been for President Obama.

From hitting a new low in his approval ratings at the beginning of last week, he regained the upper-hand by pulling the rug from underneath Donald Trump’s ‘dog-whistle’ campaign and fantasy presidential bid. Having removed residual doubts about his place of birth (among reasonable people at any rate), he rounded off the week with the announcement that American forces had captured and killed Osama Bin Laden who orchestrated the terrorist acts of September 11, 2001 that remains seared in the collective memory of Americans and the world at large.

It is now clear what President Obama meant by “I’ve got better stuff to do,” in his repudiation of the fringe elements in the Birther movement and parts of the complicit media last week. While Trump was ruminating over whether, as the conservative writer David Frum put it, “a pregnant Stanley Ann Dunham in the summer of 1961 boarded a propeller plane from Honolulu to Los Angeles, then from Los Angeles to New York City, then from New York City to Gander, then from Gander to London, then from London to Nairobi – and then repeated the trip backward a few weeks later – all so that her baby could acquire Kenyan nationality”, Obama was busy concluding plans with the CIA and the US military to take-out the mastermind of the single worst terrorist atrocity of the 21st century. The contrast between Obama and Trump could not have been starker. No doubt nutters like Trump will demand to see Osama Bin Laden’s body before they believe the President’s word.

While the death of Osama bin Laden does not in itself represent an end to his brand of Islamic terrorism, it is symbolically significant. It will not eliminate or reduce the incidence of future acts of terrorism, but the world is a better place without him.

Politically, it represents huge opportunities for Obama’s re-election. Even after pulling the US financial system from the brink of collapse; saving the US automobile industry against (unsolicited) advice from financial experts on Wall Street and the commentariat in their house Journal; having enacted the most wide-reaching social legislation since the 1960s with the prospect of near-universal health care for all Americans closer than ever before, Americans have been stubbornly unwilling to give this most transformational of Presidents much credit for his efforts and achievements thus far. Indeed in the mid-term elections of November 2010, they gave his party a mighty drubbing which lost control of the House of Representatives, many governorships and seats in several state legislatures.

Within weeks, however, he bounced back with a raft of legislation on the Bush tax cuts, extension of unemployment benefit, a health bill for 9/11 first responders, Don’t Ask Don’t Tell and secured congressional ratification of the most far-reaching nuclear-arms reduction agreement with Russia in what is commonly acknowledged to have been the most productive lame duck session of any Congress in recent history.

With the killing of Osama bin Laden, not only has President Obama delivered on his campaign promise but his hand has been strengthened to authorise the draw-down of US military troops in Afghanistan as he promised during his speech at West Point in December 2009. Then, Obama was bounced by more hawkish elements in his government and military, from Hillary Clinton to General Stanley McChrystal and Robert Gates, into ordering a surge in troops. Determined not to be portrayed as weak on national security, he went along reluctantly with the demand for 30,000 additional troops after several reviews of the new counterinsurgency strategy. Ever the smart guy, he left himself some wiggle room and promised to “begin the transfer of [US] forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011” which many thought ill-advised at the time and no more than a sop to his Democratic base.

To be sure many of his supporters in the Democratic Party were disappointed with the troop surge and the assumption has since been that their disillusionment with the ratcheting-up of the war in Afghanistan and President Obama’s apparent willingness to compromise with conservatives would lead to a low and unenthusiastic turnout among his base in the 2012 presidential elections.

The killing of Osama Bin Laden, however, has the potential to change all that. President Obama can now stand-up to the hawkish elements in his administration and order the commencement of the military draw-down he promised at West Point as soon as July 2011. He will be credited by moderates and neutrals for the demise of America’s most wanted criminal even though his has been part of a collective effort that was years in the making. While it is not quite mission accomplished, the wiggle room he left himself appears to have paid off.

With the current backlash against the Republicans and Paul Ryan’s hard-line budget that seeks to penalize seniors and the middle-class in the short-term, while making the Bush tax cuts for the rich permanent, without reducing the US deficit and long-term debt, Obama has every opportunity to re-energize his base for the 2012 campaign.

Of course events over the next several weeks and months could change all of that again. But for now, the capture and killing of Osama Bin Laden has transformed President Obama’s electoral fortunes and he is poised to be re-elected President of the United States in 2012. No wonder he was brimming with so much confidence at the White House Correspondents Dinner just the other day. What a ‘helluva’ of smart – and lucky – guy!

Ekow Nelson lives and works in London and has an interest in world affairs and politics

Picture: President Barack Obama delivers a statement.

Way forward

It is widely acknowledged amongst our cultural Diaspora that, while land is of vital concern to almost everyone, it is also a highly sensitive subject and therefore, best left well alone by all but the most daring or, some would say the foolhardy. I think perhaps, now is the time to think in terms of a Citizens’ Constitutional Forum for tackling difficult issues like this in the interest of public education both for the actual and potential landlessness in the Ga traditional areas.

Land is a highly politicised in the way it is treated in the national debate, but it is too important a subject to just be left to the politicians. This is not to say that we should take it out of politics altogether because, at the end of the day, it is the politicians who have to decide on land policies, and after a long hard look, look at whether we should in fact run a workshop on land, I believe it is now time to take the bull by the horns and do so.

Time is of the utmost urgency, and we have set the discussion on this agenda this particular weekend. We should plan the workshop in such a way that it will include Ga chiefs and leaders, Ga members of parliament, Ga academics and most important of all Ga landowners, tenants, growers and agricultural workers and members of the business community (including private housing developers).  We should also consider the implications of land policy for the tourist industry.

A well known American once said “The life of the Nation is Secure only while the nation is Honest, Truthful and Virtuous”. I believe that this quotation applies as much to the land issue as it does to other issues of public policy, probably more so. We need to be honest with each other and with the nation if we are to develop sensible and sustainable land policies that add to the prosperity of the nation.

The land issue is fraught with serious stumbling blocks, which we must overcome in order to reach a solution for future generations. Firstly, we need to recognise that land is a divisive issue not only between communities but among indigenous Ga’s also. The distribution of productive land amongst indigenous Ga’s is uneven, and changing circumstances have placed significant pressure on those families that lack sufficient land to sustain a livelihood.

Secondly, we need to tackle the chronic lack of foresight and political will that undermine effective resolution of looming land problems. Absence of forward planning and consensus in the case of expiring leases is also a problem.

Land is an emotionally charged issue whose air of mystique acts as an impediment to rational discussion. While it would be naïve to think that you could take politics out of the land issue, politicians have been all too ready to perpetuate the prejudices of their constituencies, rather than articulate a clear vision that would take the nation forward as a whole.

Maybe we need as Gadangmes, to form a Ga Native Land Trust Board through which all land and land sales have to be registered.

The other major players will be the Chiefs. Their collective leadership will be critical in providing the impetus for goodwill and understanding that must necessarily accompany major changes to land policy. We must remind them that “those who desire to rule, says Aristotle, must first submit to be ruled”. The chiefs, too must submit themselves to discipline

We need to address a resettlement programme with more vigour and compassion. The unabated and haphazard expansion of squatter settlements in peri-urbanAccrawill, if not managed properly, inevitably lead to social tensions. It is no coincidence that this urban drift has accelerated at a time when infrastructure development in rural areas has been given low priority, and rural dwellers, particularly the young, have opted for education and employment opportunities in the larger centres.

Having looked at some of the dimensions of the current debate, I would like to suggest a few ideas of my own, not as radical as Ade will have you believe but as a way forward to formulating sensible policies on land.

1             If we must accept that we cannot remove politics and tribe from the debate, let us at least resolve to treat each other with a reasonable level of civility and goodwill. This should begin in my view with parliament which is responsible for setting the tone for the national debate, and which should therefore encourage thoughtful consideration of the issues at hand.

2             The constitution must be amended so that we are compelled to reach a consensus by a two thirds majority on Land issues. A bipartisan approach therefore becomes necessary.

3             Any changes to land policy should be fair and equitable to landowners and tenants alike and must take into account the broader national interest over the medium to long term

4             Rather than expect a quick fix we need to address fundamental questions of land ownership and administration, and do so within the overall objective of realising the productive potential of the land.

5             Every stakeholder is entitled to a voice in the process of consultation and negotiation, particularly landowners, tenants and Chiefs (council of chiefs).

6             Landowners must be in a position to make informed choices about the future development of land, based on sound and objective advice.

7             Policy makers need to determine and promote a national strategy for the revival of the rural sector. We need to take a significant leap forward in sustainable commercial production accompanied by necessary developments in infrastructure.

8             Last but not least NATIONALIZATION OF ALL GHANA LANDS

By that I mean the abolition of freehold tenure is called for (i.e. the fee simple estate and the absolute proprietorship estate). This does not mean abolition of individual tenure or ascertainable rights of access in land. Nor does it entail the nationalization of land as such (which would mean a communist type of ownership).

Since the freehold estates now existing in Accra are unlimited in scope and duration in favour of an individual proprietor, their abolition would mean the freeing of land from the shackles of both individual and chieftaincy caprice and pave the way for a dynamic redistribution of land in the future. Freehold title could then be replaced by a well worked out system of leasehold title. This system will vest the government with greater control over all land inGhana. It would allow the government through the instrumentality of law to suppress the quantum of interests in land (reduce the size of individual landholding) in favour of the redistributive and re-allocation needs of society. The structure of and normative content of this frame work of landownership is a matter suited for a more detailed and researched study.

Conclusion

Land is definitely life, more so in a third world country like ours. Any policies that would lead to the ejection of man from his source of life into a world of uncertainty and homelessness are intrinsically flawed and inherently dangerous.Ghanahas followed some such policies. Land tenure reform in the direction of guaranteeing more universal access to land is, therefore, called for.

The transformation of property rights in the Ga state.

As Firman Sellers states in her book the transformation of property rights in the Gold coast, she defines property rights as “the power to limit the ability of other persons to enjoy the benefits to be secured from the use and enjoyment of material good”. The enforcement of those rights gives one actor, the rights-holder, the economic profit from a given source. It also gives that actor the power to exclude all others from using that resource in any capacity. As we can all see this is in conflict with the theory of rights that has been described above that there is no hierarchy in the rights to land.

She further states that the transformation of property right redistributes both wealth and power. The process is inherently prone to conflict.  Individuals and groups in society likely will mobilize to articulate a new, definition of property rights that are favourable from a distributional point of view (and so claim a privileged place in society), or defined against a change in the already favourable status quo. These people may lobby state actors directly to capture the state’s coercive power and enforce their preferred property rights system. Or, they may seek to create an alternative source of authority, enforcing property rights privately or at a local level. In either case, the subjects’ actions are a crucial determinant of which property rights system is enforced, and whether that system is secure. The state alone does not dictate the outcome.

The transformation of property rights is a product of the interaction between state and society. State rulers create or manipulate political institutions to pursue their own goals. Individuals in society compete within the shadow of those institutions to secure a privileged share of society’s resources. Combined, the two groups’ actions determine both the structure of property rights and the degree to which those rights are enforced.

The transformation of property rights to land in the Gold coast, nowGhana, vividly illustrates these theoretical propositions. Throughout the Gold Coast, the imposition of colonial rule coincided with a rapid appreciation in land values. Officials of the colonial state announced that they would uphold customary land tenure and delegated enforcement powers to the chiefs of the Colony’s many traditional states. These mandates established the framework within which indigenous actors battled one another to claim the now valuable resource by redefining property rights to land.

Under colonial rule, indigenous actors fought to “re-invent tradition”. They struggled to articulate a distributionally favourable version of customary land tenure and enforce it within the traditional state. Their efforts in conjunction with and in response pronouncements, determined whether-and which –property rights were enforced. Now to understand how these rights existed with in the Ga state we need to examine the origins of the Ga state.

The Origins of the Ga State

It is extraordinarily difficult to construct an image of the Ga state prior to colonial rule, both because the Ga have been in contact with the Europeans since the 17th century and because the traditional state structures have been profoundly changed by the institutions of indirect rule. Anthropologists believe that the Ga state was originally little more than a loose federation of independent republics, all united in military alliance. Most of these republics lie in the area now known asAccra. Each republic possessed a stool; but, in contrast to that of the neighbouring Akan states, the Ga stool was a symbol of military power, rather than a symbol of government. The stool’s occupant, the Ga Mantse, served as an honorary military leader and did not exercise any real political power.

Ga land tenure likewise differed from the Akan model. The Ga are generally believed to practice patrilineal inheritance, whereas for the Akan the system is matrilineal. Moreover, all Ga Land was vested in the lineages who first occupied the land, rather than in the stools.

According to Ga customary law, each member of the lineage can claim rights of usufruct over some portion of lineage land. If that person dies or cannot use the land productively, then the land that he or she had held, along with any improvements made upon it, ordinarily reverts to the lineage. Under some conditions, however, the family member might be allowed to claim the family land as personal property that he or she can sell or deed to others.

The management and allocation of lineage land are undertaken by that lineage’s principal members who are elected by all family members; and by a family head, elected by the principal members. The family head oversees the use of family lands. He or she decides who may use which tract of land, how the proceeds from the land will be distributed amongst family members, and how the land can be developed. The family head also decides when family member can claim private rights to family land, and when family land can be sold to non-members.

The imposition of colonial rule altered the institutions of the traditional state. In so doing, colonialism shaped the strategies that indigenous actors would adopt in their battle to claim economic and political resources. The passage of the Native Jurisdiction Ordinance in 1878 transformed the loose federation of Ga republics into a rigid hierarchy. The NJO divided the independent republics into 10 divisions; two divisions were further divided into a number of quarters, the divisions in Accra was known as Ga Mashie and outside Accra were known as leeward Ga.

Equally important, the NJO elevated the office of mantse, giving its occupant full authority over all other traditional offices. Each division was thus governed by a mantse, and the state as a whole was governed by the Ga Mantse, the paramount chief. With later ordinances, the individual mantsemei were empowered to forge state councils and native tribunals through which they issued statements of customary law and arbitrated local disputes.

These political changes were paralleled by extensive economic change. The Ga state encompassedAccra, a thriving urban centre. In conjunction with the Native Jurisdiction Ordinance, the British designatedAccrathe administrative capital of the Gold coast colony. The British decision caused the value of Ga land to increase. Ga land had long been valued as a site for commercial trade and some farming; but now, the land acquired additional value as the site for government buildings, residential construction and increased levels of commercial (and later industrial) enterprise.

The commercialisation of Ga lands provoked an intense battle among indigenous actors to claim more exclusive rights to the land. Whoever secured such rights would garner considerable economic wealth: the rights-holder would receive the compensation payments made by colonial officials when the colonial government appropriated Ga land; and the rights holder would receive the profits from the private investment he or she made on surrounding land.

Colonial institutions propelled the battle to appropriate this new wealth into the traditional state. Ga residents – both elite and non elite sought to secure a favourable share of that wealth by re-inventing customary land tenure. Throughout the period of colonial rule, different groups would argue simultaneously that customary law invested ownership of all Ga lands in private individuals, extended families, divisional stools and paramount stool.

Ga residents sought to enforce their claims by reinventing the institutions of the traditional state. The Native Jurisdiction Ordinance transformed traditional institutions into repositories of political power. Whoever gained control over those institutions would be in a position to enforce his preferred version of customary land tenure.

The changes wrought by colonial rule ignited a prolonged battle to control the definition of tradition in the Ga state. The fluid situation we have over Ga lands inAccranow is as a direct result of these changes.

The Ga elite’s effort to enforce a family cantered definition of customary land tenure disinherited both the Ga chiefs and a substantial portion of the Ga citizenry. In 1921, representatives of this disadvantaged group (called Manbii) mobilized to articulate a different, more distributionally favourable definition of customary law. They failed in their efforts.

The descendants of the Reindorf family were prominent members of the Gold Coast elite. Family members aggressively pursued new economic opportunities and embraced the external trappings of western society; yet they maintained close and active ties to the traditional state from which they descended.

The Reindorf family’s response to the commercialization of land in the Ga state reflects the incentive structure created by the institutions of indirect rule. Given the British determination to uphold traditional institutions, and given the Africans’ fear that Europeans would purchase all land were it offered for sale, the Ga elites could not demand the privatization of land. Instead, the Ga elites sought to strengthen their rights over land (and thus further their economic pursuits) by reinventing tradition.

First, the members of the Reindorf family defended a version of customary law that vested all land in the extended family, rather than in the divisional or paramount stools. Second, the family members manipulated the family history so as to narrow the boundaries of the extended family and reduce the number of claimants to family land. Third, the Reindorfs struggled to enforce their preferred version of custom by re-inventing the institutions of the traditional state. They sought to gain control of over the Ga mantse, or paramount chief, because the Mantse had the authority to arbitrate all land disputes brought before the Ga Native Tribunal.

It is estimated that millions of hectares representing a substantial part of Ga lands were expropriated in freeholds by the Ga elite through their political power and wealth during the colonial period. In consequence men women and children of the Ga mashie area of the Ga state were at independence technically landless.

The collapse of indirect rule and the transition to independent government altered the framework within which property rights were enforced.

In recent times land acquisition is governed by State lands act and according to the state lands act 1962 (act 125), any land – stool, family, private may be compulsorily acquired where the government considers it in the public interest. An executive instrument must be published specifying the site, land dimensions, and time of acquisition. The act is specifically aimed at extinguishing all prior interests and encumbrances on the land. Once applied, the only right remaining to previous holders is lump sum compensation currently determined and processed by the land valuation board. Conflicts over claims of interest or disagreements over the level of compensation are to be taken to the state lands tribunal, whose decisions are appealable to the Court of Appeal.

In addition to the state lands act, section 7 of the administration of lands act, 1962, provides a facility by which the administration and management of stool land may be vested in the state in trust for the stool concerned. Looks good on paper but we all know that is not the practice especially inAccraover Ga lands. While conveyance of freehold title is permitted in the case of private land or freehold, there is some confusion over transfer of family land. The Koforidua lands secretariat presently treats transfers of family lands as stool lands requiring a lease and concurrence as technically, under the existing constitution; private transfer of family land is illegal. The regional lands secretary in Koforidua mused that further court cases are likely to occur as a result of this confusion, with individuals desiring title to family lands suing the government. The body of law of law that governs land rights, land markets, lease terms, rental prices, compulsory land acquisitions for the public domain, and land registration relevant to the Accra peri-urban economy is in its own right impressive, yet not without weaknesses. Ambiguity over whether family lands are or are not to be treated along with stool lands under the general rules governing customary tenure are creating uncertainties regarding which rights are held, and which government provisions apply.

Based on further reconnaissance visits throughout the peri-urban area ofAccrain 1993 and 1994, four contextual situations were observed that reflect varying degrees of tenure security or conflict associated with land access and transfers:

T1     Type I. Land transactions under customary tenure occur expeditiously and generally without serious disputes over land among households within the community. Communities widely disseminate the proceeds of land sales to residents through cash transfers, land allocations, or community improvements.

T2     Type II. Proceeds from land sales are not widely distributed to residents, but rather benefit the chief or other influential families in the community.

T3     Type III. Customary tenure systems exhibit conflict or stress; serious disputes are present or at risk between neighbouring or competing stools or families.

T4     Type IV. The central government through compulsory acquisition acquires stool or family land and allocates land to outsiders at subsidised prices. Rates of compensation negotiated between government and the community, however, are subsequently not paid by government causing resentment and welfare loss in the concerned community. Serious disputes arise between local authorities and central government.

T5     Type V. Community lands are registered, and government plays a positive role in protecting the land rights of its citizens.

Four research sites were selected that exhibit to greater or less degrees one or more characteristic of the above typologies:

1     Gbawe and Amasaman (T1, T3, and T5). Gbawe village, located roughly 9 miles fromAccra, represents the customary land tenure system at its best. Once a small village, it has now been entirely engulfed by the wave of residential settlement moving outward fromAccracity. Village lands have been sold by the chief to outsiders investing in residential improvements. But unlike some chiefs inAccracity, the traditional authority has been using the “earnest” or “drink” money obtained in land transactions to make infrastructural improvements in the area and to help Gbawe residents. Amasaman is a medium sized village located on the Accra-Nsawam road about 14 miles fromAccracity and 7 miles north of Gbawe. Residential developments are emerging in the area, but the village is also a site of commercial pineapple production. Both sites in the Greater Accra region.

2     Ofankor (T2 and T4). ThevillageofOfankoris a site where government has acquired a substantial portion of the village landholdings through administrative edict and allocates land for residential development. Ofankor is located just west of Nsawam/Kumasi road north ofAccra.

3     Ashongman (t1, T4, and T5). In the Atomic Energy residential area, a tacit dispute has arisen between the government and a chief over the right to allocate residential land. These two areas are adjacent to each other in the northern suburbs ofAccra.

Gbawe, in the far western suburbs ofAccra, and Amasaman are located nearest to the urbanAccracentre. Gbawe has already been entirely engulfed by the residential influx. Ashongman and Ofankor, both near Gbawe are suffering duress, the former from a poorly functioning customary land market, and the latter from state intervention in the control of land assets.

54 years on from independence, land sales in the peri-urban area ofAccra; represent an important source of revenue for the community. Many millions of cedis are earned in some years depending on the number of plots sold. While constitutional provisions stipulate that a fixed percentage of ground rent collections are to be returned to the stool, no funds have been paid to the stool for some years now. The stool has asked for the funds on various occasions but has been informed that no money is available. Gbawe’s residents are unhappy with this, but communities generally feel helpless in challenging government.