Nurturing Sustainable Prosperity in West Africa by Stephen Armah

Author:Stephen Armah
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030374907
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

Time for Some Short Stories in True Ghanaian Tradition

Let’s now re-acquaint ourselves with the characters from the first part of this book. Two friends from college (an American and a Ghanaian) re-unite in Ghana, 25 years after graduating from an American college where they were roommates and intimate friends. Such a reunion is a potentially stimulating and rewarding encounter.

Kofi, the Ghanaian, seized the opportunity to introduce Allen to Ghana and explained how aspects of the culture that helps in keeping the peace may be leading to apathy and aggravating corruption. Kofi does this through recounting some of his own experiences with the central theme running through them being the apathy that has engulfed the country in the post-military regime period and nurturing corruption.

Kofi explains through his narratives that the famous peace-loving and forgiving characteristic of Ghanaian culture is combining with the apathy evident from the post-military period of freedom to nurture indiscipline and give a sense of disorganization. This may not only directly push down productivity as it demotivates the people to work hard but create fertile grounds for corruption.

Ghana has had a functioning democracy since 1992 when military ruler and benign dictator Jerry John Rawlings handed over power to himself as an elected president. The freedom coming with that after initial state control where the state was the provider coupled with the very empathetic character of Ghanaians has led to a phenomenon this author terms “enye hwee” to mean “it does not matter” raising the incentives for corrupt behavior.

Kofi encourages Allen to respond with “enye hwee” if he detected apathy in a situation in each of the short stories he narrates in like manner to the naming of a child in Ghana. During the naming ceremony among the Ga, the indigenes of Ghana’s capital, Accra, the Wulomo or fetish priest pours libation, utters some chants to which the crowd responds “yao!” to signal agreement almost like an “Amen.”

The first story Kofi tells is of an itinerant, commercial peddler of local drugs, herbs and concoctions who travels in commercial vehicles selling formal prescription drugs in Ghana which is against the formal laws of Ghana.

The practice goes unchecked partly because of a very permissive and empathetic Ghanaian disposition toward the informal sector and an ineffective Ghana Standards Board (GSB) which hesitates whenever it deals with Ghana’s large informal sector. There are unconfirmed stories of standard board officials accepting bribes instead of punishing such behavior. While there is no evidence that this is true, it does beg the question, “why has this practice persisted for so long?” For emphasis, we dramatize the exchange between Kofi and Allen.Kofi:

There is an interesting character who travels on these commercial buses selling medicines and anything from aspirin to Viagra. He gains the trust of the passengers by saying Christian prayers for the journey. In Ghana, which is one of most religious country in the world, such a service is widely appreciated. He then proceeds to sell his medicines for about ten minutes before asking the driver to let him off the bus.

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