Obama Coming

Coming from a country with a long established democratic process, I take peaceful elections and changes in government for granted. Sadly, Ghana is currently one of the very few examples of an African country which can claim such elections. Ghana’s fifth peaceful election and second change in ruling party, late in 2008 continues to draw praise and accolades from across Africa and beyond. There was little mention of President Mills’ recent visit to the UK by the British press (as they seemed more preoccupied with ride-on lawnmowers, pet food and moat cleaning) but the Ghanaian media recorded Gordon Brown’s complimentary remarks on Ghana’s democratic maturity. However, just to prove that some things are the same the world over, the ‘Daily Guide’ published photographs of the lavish Kensington hotel and even the bed where Mills slept. It was clearly indignant about the cost to Ghanaians of taking a party of thirty to London. (A subsequent government statement noted that the majority of the places were actually paid for the British government. Ironically, the Ghanaian government paid for the accompanying journalists!)

For many, however, the ultimate reward for Ghana’s performance will come in July, when Barack Obama will make a one night stop here on his return journey from the G8 summit. Within hours of the announcement by the White House, attention was being drawn to the fact that Obama’s first trip to sub-Saharan Africa (he will be in Egypt in June) will not be to Kenya, his ancestral home, as many expected. Kenya, as the New York Times put it, is ‘deemed to troubled to visit’.

Ghana has clearly caught the attention of the US. It is only fifteen months since Ghana hosted Obama’s immediate predecessor. The image of George W. Bush pounding shea nuts while Laura looked on, in a newspaper photograph is still fresh in the mind, as is the lengthy list of roads which had to close in Accra for security reasons. Added to a visit by Bill Clinton in 1998, this must make Ghana one of a very small number of countries to host three successive American presidents.

To say that Obama will get an enthusiastic welcome here is obviously an under statement. He will be regarded as one of their own by Ghanaians, despite his considerably more eastern origins. In 2008 his election victory was, to my recollection, the only non-domestic news story to make the front page of the ‘Daily Graphic’. I am looking forward to the local souvenir business going into overdrive.

One article I found on the internet was not concerned about Kenya, but was more interested in the fact that Obama would be visiting Ghana, rather than nearby Nigeria. The rivalry between the two most important English-speaking countries in West Africa can be very tense sometimes. Nigeria, the dominant country in the sub-region and comfortably the most populous country in Africa is regarded by many Ghanaians as a very bad place. One timely illustration of this mutual dislike is the ‘sex scandal’ which is currently ‘rocking’ Koforidua. In the past week the ‘Daily Guide’ has reported that a Nigerian videoed himself having sex with a Koforidua woman and them posted the footage on-line. The footage has been widely downloaded. Even the picture on the front of the paper drew large crowds around local newsstands, as Koforiduans tried to identify the woman. She is alleged to come from my district of town. There are certainly Nigerians in Koforidua, but with no actual proof of the identity of the perpetrator, the article on the second day referred to a student from a ‘neighbouring country’. Nigeria was not mentioned at all. The local women, famously known throughout Ghana as ‘Koforidua flowers’, are not amused at this slur on their character. According to the second article, they intend to demonstrate against ‘foreigners’.