THE COUNTDOWN TO INDEPENDENCE: PT-1

Folks, this is a 5-part installment of a presentation on "The countdown to Independence". This presentation was done from months of research work from the Balm library, Ghana@50 website and from other Internet sites in general. It is my hope that this article will throw some more light on Ghana's struggle to attain independence from the colonial masters and how we have traveled down the political road to hit milestone number 53. Please read on ...

HISTORY OF THE REPUBLIC OF GHANA

The Republic of Ghana, formerly called the Gold Coast and a former colony of the British Empire is situated in the Gulf of Guinea between longitude 3 15' W and 1 12' East, latitude 5 and 10 north. It is bounded to the East by the Republic of Togo, a former French colony, to the West by Ivory Coast, also a former French colony, and to the North by Burkina Faso, also a former French colony, and the South by the Atlantic Ocean. Its land mass covers a total of about 238,500 sq km. Ghana was called the "Gold Coast" by the European merchants, and was known by this name until the attainment of Independence in 1957.

The name Ghana was suggested by the Hon. J.B. Danquah of the Big Six. In the late 1920's, a number of political parties dedicated to the regaining of African Independence sprang up, but neither these nor the United Gold Coast Convention (U.G.C.C.), which was founded in 1947, were nationally based. They also ignored the aspirations of the large numbers of workers attracted to the cities by the boom in public works. Aware of this, the then secretary-general of the U.G.C.C, Kwame Nkrumah, broke away in 1948 to found his own political party - the Convention People's Party (C.P.P.). It quickly became the voice of the masses and, for the first time, drew the north into national politics; its slogan was "Self-Government Now".

Today, the population of Ghana is about 22 million with the highest population densities on the urban areas. The principal ethnic groups are the Akans who constitute about 45% of the population is made up of the Ashanti, the Fanti, the Ahanta, the Guan, the Bonu, the Akyem, the Akwamu, the Kwahu, the Akwapim, the Sefwi and the Nzema; the Mole, Dagbani, 16% is made up of Nanumba, Dagbani, Mamprusi, Wala, Bruilsa, Frafra, Talensi and Kusasi; the Ewe, 13% made up of the Anlo, the Some, the Tongu and the Ewedome; the Ga-Adangbe, 9% made up of the Ga, the Shai or Adamgbe, the Ada and the Krobo or the Kloli; the Gurma, 4% and the Grusi, 2% made up of the Mo, the Sisala, the Kasena, the Vagala and the Tampolene,. Living among the Ewe is non-Ewe speaking groups such as the Akpafu, the Lolobi, the Likpe, the Santrokofi, the Nkonya, the Avatime, the Logba and the Tafii.

The peoples of Ghana are composed of two principal linguistic groups: the Gur and the Kwa group of languages, which are respectively spoken to the north and south of the Gurma and the Grusi and the speakers of Kwa are the Akan, the Guan, the Ewe and the Ga-Adamgbe.

British Colonial Rule

Even though the British colonial rule, in the strict sense, was not established until after the Berlin Conference of 1884 - 1885, British power and jurisdiction in the Gold Coast began to take firm roots from the beginning of the 19th century when George Maclean laid the foundations for expansion of British influence. In 1830 Maclean arrived in Cape Coast and his instructions were explicit. He was not to interfere in the affairs of the states of the Gold Coast; he was only to ensure that British interests were adequately protected. Maclean was, however, a practical man who realised that British trade and missionary activities would only thrive in an atmosphere of peace and order. Thus contrary to his remit he actually engaged the British, Fante and Asante in engendering harmonious relations that won him the admiration and confidence of all and ensured that trade between the coast and the interior flourished. Maclean’s term of office ended in 1843 and in that year he became the Judicial Assessor of British Forts on the coast until he died in 1847.

Commander Hill, who was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of British Forts and Castles in the Gold Coast, succeeded Maclean. He recognised that the success of his predecessor derived in part from the harmonious relations that he established in the Gold Coast; he therefore proceeded to formalize the relations in a short document of three paragraphs signed initially by seven coastal chiefs on 6th March 1844 and subsequently by ten other chiefs. The document, which has be come to be known as the Bond of 1844, represented the first major imperial assault on the rights and powers of Gold Coasters to administer their own affairs. It outlawed certain customary practices and provided that criminal cases were to be tried by British officials in conjunction with the chiefs.

In view of the fact that Ghana attained independence on the 113th anniversary of the making of the document occasioning some dubious interpretations, the entire documents is reproduced below for its full effect: Whereas the power and jurisdiction have been exercised for and on behalf of Her Majesty the Queen of the Great Britain and Ireland, within divers countries and places adjacent to her Majesty’s forts and settlements on the Gold Coast, we the chiefs of countries and places so referred to adjacent to the said forts and settlements, do hereby acknowledge that power and jurisdiction, and declare that the first objects of law are the protection of individuals and property.

1. Human sacrifices and other barbarous customs, such Panyarring, are abominations and contrary to law.

2. Murders, robberies and other crimes and offences will be tried and inquired of before the Queen’s judicial officers and the chiefs of the district, molding the customs of the country to the general principles of British law done at Cape Coast Castle, before his Excellency the Lieutenant Governor on this 6th day of March, in the year of our Lord, 1844.

The chiefs of Denkyira, Abora, Asen Attandasu, Asen Apemanim, Dominase, Anomabu, Cape Coast, Twifu, Ekumfi, Adwumako, Gomoa, Asikuma, Nsaba, Wassa Amenfi, Wassa Fiasi, Dixcove and Jamestowwn signed the document. Even though the document did not concede much by way of rights to the British it nonetheless, concretized the process of consolidating British power, authority and jurisdiction begun by Maclean. Indeed, only twelve years after the making of document nearly all structures of government were established:

a Legislative Council which in 1857 was to be composed of the Governor, the Chief Justice, the Colonial Secretary and the Officer commanding the Gold Coast Corps was established in 1850 and in exercise of its powers it enacted the Poll Tax Ordinance in April 1852; the first Supreme Court presided over by a Chief Justice in 1853; and the Gold Coast Corps in 1856.

The growth of British power and jurisdiction did not go unchallenged. Notable individuals who challenged the encroachment on the rights and powers of the peoples of the Gold Coast were Kodwo Tsibu, Chief of Denkyira, Kaku Ackah, Chief of Nzema and John Aggrey, Chief of Cape Coast who achieved many distinctions: the first chief to challenge the legal basis of British rule in the Gold Coast; the first chief to work in close collaboration with educated Gold Coasters; the first chief to send a delegation to Britain to plead his cause and the first chief to achieve martyrdom by being deposed and exiled to Sierra Leone for championing the cause of self determination in the Gold Coast. In addition, by the turn of the 19th century, the Fante Confederation, the Accra Native Confederation and the Aborigines Rights Protection Society founded in 1868, 1869 and 1898 respectively protested the illegal extension of British power, authority and jurisdiction in the Gold Coast.

The primary aim of the Fante Confederation stated in its constitutions made in January 1868, November 1871 and April 1872 was to declare the Fante states independent of the British. Other aims included establishing a confederate government over the Fante states headed by a ‘king-president’, who was to be assisted in the performance of his duties by an Executive Council composed of ‘a vice-president, secretary, under-secretary and a treasurer’ which was also the final Court of Appeal for the Confederation; a Representative Assembly to legislate for the Confederation made up of two representatives from each member state and a National Assembly which was to meet once a year in October to consider work done by the Confederation.

The Accra Native Confederation was not as successful as the Fante Confederation but it evinced the ambition of being the germ of a native confederate government’. The founding of the Fante and the Accra Native Confederations marked the consolidation and intensification of the individual and sporadic protests against the expansion of British power in the Gold Coast. After Britain defeated Asante in 1874 it took further administrative, judicial, financial and social measures to consolidate its power and authority. On 24 July 1874, it converted its forts and settlements in the Gold Coast into Crown Colony and declared a protectorate over all states south of the Pra. In 1857 it re-established the Supreme Court and followed it up in 1877 with the transfer of its operational headquarters from Cape Coast to Accra.

Additional drastic measures were to follow. In 1883, the Native Jurisdiction Ordinance, which vested in the Governor the power to interfere in chieftancy matters and to depose aa chief was enacted. Further, in 1894-1897 it proposed a Lands Bill that would vest all vacant lands in the Queen of the United Kingdom. This naturally invoked the indignation of the peoples of the Gold Coast and occasioned the founding of the Aborigines Rights Protection Society in 1887 that successfully campaigned against the enactment of the Bill.

The extraordinary patriotic act by John Mensah Sarbah, the newly qualified Gold Coast lawyer, in not accepting the handsome retainer of £400 for preparing and arguing the case of the Aborigines Society must be emphasized. The legal fee was subsequently utilized by the Aborigines Society to acquire a press that published its paper The Gold Coast Aborigines, the first issue of which appeared on 1st January 1898.

To be continued ...