I was just beginning to become a little depressed here in Ghana – not sure of my purpose here on campus as I have a harder time learning and challenging myself each day as they becoming more monotonous and routine – but I had an experience today that exhilarated me to a point I have not yet felt here. My experience sitting in my economic anthropology class was refreshing beyond belief, hopefully both for me and for my local classmates. I am now going to turn that classroom inside-out, but with the exception of my agency in this vein, this must be understood to be a Ghanaian experience with Ghanaian actors and Ghanaian origin. Allow me to humbly refract the conversation I was a witness to only hours ago. A conversation about the coming Ghanaian Revolution.
My economic anthropology course began as it always does, with the professor reciting to the class from his lecture notes. Today our discussion centered upon the Dependency Theory that held that “globalization and socio-economic inequalities among different societies are the result of historical exploitation of the poor, underdeveloped societies by the rich, developed societies.” Our professor, Dr. Fritz Biveridge, would routinely waver off onto heated tangents about the state of the Ghanaian people today. Today was no exception. He rejected the Dependency Thesis, he told us, because previously colonized countries that have had extensive contact with the developed, Western world have seen vast economic growth – citing examples like Brazil, Singapore, and India – while some countries that have had little contact with the Western world have remained stagnant, or worse, have taken a deeper nosedive. He explained that Africa is like a hungry man sitting on a gold mine, not noticing the changes needed to be made to make use of it. He exploded: “so my brothers and sisters, we need to do something. I am against the fact that a third of our money comes from the West - are we saying that without Western money we cant grow? How come countries like India and Brazil, also colonized, are today industrialized countries?”
But a student – whom I later learned was named Efriye (hope the spelling isn’t butchered) – could not hold himself back: “but those countries maintain their traditional ways of life to some extent.” This is what Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana’s first president) tried to do, he explained, not submit to either the straight-jacket of pure socialism or of pure capitalism but to synchronize the best of both models to fit Ghana’s culture and tradition. But since then we have gone astray, he contended passionately. First of all, from his 20 years of experience in over 5 churches, he has recognized that “[non-traditional] religion is not clean of blame.” Outcries were heard across the class, the loudest from the professor, but the young man courageously demanded he be heard. He described how men and women that can barely afford a meal will donate to the church – because it supports them in essentially meaningful ways such as marriage and funeral rites – but they refuse to pay taxes to the state. Instead, the money goes to pastors who are rich beyond belief: “but one pastor’s car can establish a company that will employ 20 people!” Even if they paid money to the state, politics are totally broken, he continued. His voice was getting louder, “Ghanaians, whatever their party, will remain loyal to it regardless of circumstance, instead of listening to their leaders’ policies!” All the politicians have to do then is earn and spend more money campaigning and earning allegiance without worrying much about making real change.
The professor, having listened intently, was visibly impressed. “This man has made some very good points, but I don’t think religion is to blame. It’s our attitude.” He talked about how people buy obscene, foreign-made gifts that they cannot afford for Christmas, how companies are not hiring nor training newly graduated students, how people carelessly throw their trash out onto the street, and how the University of Ghana would soon be available only to the rich. “The Minister of Health only visits the hospitals when the doctors and nurses strike.” But nobody speaks up! He then told us a story about his mother who was in a tragic car crash with a large truck that refused to stop and check what was ahead before making a turn. When she was sent to the hospitals, there were no doctors there because they were on vacation for Farmer’s Day, and she passed away soon after. He wanted to sue the doctor for malpractice, but he was assured that “doctors stick together” and that he would be testified against regardless of how just his claim was. “There is nobody in the world that I loved more than my mother! She might as well have been a million people to me!” he screamed, “There is no justice in this country! The whole country is sick! The politicians are sick! The financial institutions are sick!” People behind me yelled things like “we need a country overhaul” and “national re-orientation.” The professor closed: “In the next 3 years I foresee a revolution, not by the military, but by the people – you and I. And when that happens, you will see me in the front!”
In all my time in Ghana, this was the first time I was seeing real anger come to the surface over these issues, but it was obvious that it had been quietly simmering all this time. As I came up to Efriye after class to convey how impressed I was with him, it dawned on me that he seemed not to realize how much of an opportunity he had, in that moment, with the whole class behind him. Did those students merely go home, forget all about what had just happened, and return to business as usual? I hope not. I hope some brave souls will be feisty, angry, and fearless enough to light a spark under the dormant Ghanaian volcano. I hope that the bitterness – as the professor cautioned – will not explode into bloodshed but rather gain power from a tradition of non-violence. But most of all, I hope that the Ghanaian people will not accept a life without dignity, but rather demand the life they deserve by Ghanaian means and to Ghanaian ends.
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