Bursting a hernia for democracy

I’m fascinated by the hot unguarded phone calls on radio stations preceding the December 7 elections so I went traditional – to “see the Old Lady.” In the chief’s courtyard, when the elders are stuck with decision-making and need to access real wisdom, they go behind to consult the Old Lady. Today, I report to you the wise commonsense-based wisdom the Old Lady shared with me. She lamented about her disgust and unhappiness regarding the free flow of testosterone throughout this land, especially on radio stations. Ours is a young democracy that must be protected.

Testosterone is a libido hormone. Men have it more than women. Hold your breadth. I’m woman enough to make this statement – It’s a man’s world! The men of Ghana are responsible for the current flaming of passions in the media. Granted, there are a few women who also freely let go of hot-bed estrogen and testosterone. If you are in doubt of my assertion, please try this exercise for a few days. Tune in to radio discussion programmes and call-in shows from sun-up to sun-down. You would hear mostly men yelling and screaming hoarse about one topic or the other, endangering their hernias.

A super-charged combination of poisonous testosterone and unrestrained free speech on FM stations is dangerous. Two key outcomes of our development and democratic enterprise are the diffusion of radio stations and mobile telephony. Current figures obtained of privately-owned FM stations in Ghana are 166. The regional spread is as follows: The Ashanti Region tops the list with 38, followed by the Western Region (26) and Greater Accra (25). Brong Ahafo has 22, Central (15), Eastern (14), Northern (11), Volta (7), Upper West (4) and Upper East (4). So clearly, some regions are doing a whole lot of talking into the airwaves than others. The Volta and the two upper regions (East and West) are not running their mouths as much.

Technology, especially the mobile phone, is a major tool that facilitates the rapid run of restless mouths from dusk to dawn. Give Homo sapiens the freedom to speak with unguarded adrenalin rush, and throw in ICT (Information Communication Technology) innovations and what you could potentially end up with are flagrant abuses.

Times past, we had drums and gong-gong beaters who went through towns and villages to make announcements and disseminate messages. Those traditional drums have now been muffled, their places and roles taken over by the pervasive modern-day gong-gong – the mass media. The electronic media of television is more passive but radio is king.

The mass media is an agenda-setter. Callers to FM call-in shows, by default, contribute in setting our agenda in as much as they also put some opinions out there. Democracy benefits, in the final analysis. But telephone companies benefit immensely, immediately. While our radio stations get on heat with phone calls and text messages, those at the receiving end of the talking business thrive. For some callers, it is an addiction. Even when they are broke, they still find money for phone cards. Call it misplaced priority but it is gratifying to them.

Regarding the morning shows, I’ve imagined the state in which some people are when making calls. My guess is that some callers wake up, fresh, with their mouths and faces unwashed and call when stricken by a subject matter under discussion on a radio station. You can tell by listening to some callers that their voices still have that leathery feel of not fully woken up. So with stinky mouths and sleep-cracked faces, and without checking themselves, they arrive on air, and by that, in our homes and in our consciousness – to speak their unprocessed and not fully thought-through ideas. They drop these on us in the name of blessed free speech.

There are various types of callers to FM stations. Some are invited to share their expertise or respond/react to specific issues. And then, there are callers from the rank and file who just call because they too must be heard. Speaking in either English or local languages, they appear to love the experience of putting their voices out there for a feeling of satisfaction and bloated ego. These callers provide pure entertainment money cannot buy. But they are scary too. Following are descriptions of a few types of callers.

1). The Gentleman Caller (GC) starts off in a gentlemanly manner – so composed like he can’t hurt a fly. He calmly announces, “I want to contribute to your programme.” Unsuspectingly, the presenter gladly accepts and welcomes his call. Like a train, GC typically begins in low tones. But suddenly, without warning, his voice begins to crank up to a high pitch, adopting a goat-like voice. When GC arrives at this stage, he shuts off from hearing the presenter because he is in a zone and can only hear himself. At that point, if the radio presenter doesn’t cut GC off, he could slide into the gutters and may insult anything that crosses his tender mind because he is doing only one thing: speaking his mind. Afterwards, he would walk away knowing that he has just made a big fool of himself but feels good anyway.

2) The Angry Caller (AC) is already charged, temper frayed, fully warmed up before making the call. Typically, his radio is on, very loud in the background. Some of these callers are so full of hatred you couldn’t cut through the hatred with the sharpest blade. AC is like a corn-mill that grinds without getting tired. As soon as the presenter says, “You are on air. Please turn your radio off,” AC takes off grinding coarse corn, spewing out hot anger. Without apology, he is usually angry about a particular subject matter. He appears to be sponsored, with calling cards paid for by sponsoring organizations with unending re-fill privileges. After the call, he smiles with the full satisfaction that he has let off steam onto opponents, the direct target of the call. He changes the radio dial to another station to make yet another call.

3). The Clueless Caller (CL) wakes up early to do the radio rounds. He is fully armed with cell phone units. He usually has nothing of substance to say to Ghana or to himself but must call anyway. When the phone line connects, he pauses to clear his throat and asks the presenter, “Ehhm, what is the topic about? I want to make a submission.” Then he might stammer his way through, talking nothing but pure trash. Afterwards, he goes away, content and grinning with erect ears.

Some of these callers sound as if they’re just about to burst their hernias. As you listen, you can tell that something within the caller is shifting position and possibly, about to burst or drop out of him. Oh democracy, thou art great!

All these radio callers might sound annoying to our ears every morning. But on the brighter side, such annoyances are better than guns. Foul mouths, wagging tongues and ear-splitting voices are preferable to gun shots and stray bullets, if we can keep it that way forever without fists. So long as we are talking, even if we are talking shrill and hoarse, talking is still much better than guns. With talking, we will live to see another day. But with guns – well, don’t even imagine guns instead of hot talk. Tofiakwa!

+233-208286817; dorisdartey@yahoo.com;

White-Dove Royale demands peace in Ghana

The other day, for no particular reason at all beyond probably being a little bit sick upstairs in the head, I found myself in an imaginary theatre, watching a play. Screenplay: Written and produced by WW Incorporated. Revised, Fourth Draft. November 17, 2008.

FADE IN: At a residential complex of former colonial neighbourhood in the heart of privileged part of Accra. Air-conditioned room. Three guests seated on cushy-cushy couches. Outside, the hot tropical sun refuses to let off; red dust abound. Along the main road-side are children of no particular fixed addresses, beyond being unfortunately born to parents who permanently suffer from Third World credit crunch disease. The children are filled with joy as they dangerously chase after vehicles in fast motion to sell Chinese-made products. They live for today. Who cares about tomorrow? “One day at a time”, they seem to say through the purity of their innocent smiles.

CAST: Lings-Raw, White-Dove Royale and three members of Pope-Locale Club.
Lings-Raw, a tall, broad-hairy-chested, light-skinned, wealth-blossomed, gray-bearded opinionated man is pacing up and down the sprawling hall and frantically scratching his tough beard. He sits awkwardly, but briefly. He clears his throat, rises with a body stretch and growling to welcome the strange guests whose presence he has just noticed. Lings-Raw has just had a good-old breakfast. He looks bored but glad to receive guests, any guests. He enjoys the chance to speak out, to anyone, in what ordinary folks call ‘boom’ talk.

LINGS-RAW (hissing): Why has it taken you so long to come here to talk about White-Dove Royale?

Pope-Locale Club, a select white-robe wearing holy-book folks with red sash tied awkwardly around their bloated mid-sections remain calm, with a determined demeanour. They are message carriers who deliver peace messages. The messenger is also the message. Pope-Locale Club don’t fear a thing. After all, they have access to the bigger man upstairs’ mighty umbrella for protection so don’t fear any whatamacalhim bloke down here.

POPE-LOCALE CLUB: We bring greetings from God almighty! We ask that you join us on this peace journey.

LINGS-RAW: Why can’t Ghana be managed in my way? It is either my way or the high-way. (Suddenly, he notices a dove in the living room). What is this dove doing here? It will be perfect for soup. This dove will be delightfully tasty in okro soup and banku.

White-Dove Royale, a beautiful, ageless silvery-white dove, looking almost heavenly, hovers around, boldly flapping its strong wings, insisting that it gets attention.
WHITE-DOVE ROYALE: You earthly folks are talking about me as if I wasn’t here. I bring you the peace that passeth all understanding. God’s peace I bring to you! You people dare not do anything against my wishes. You can’t handle the truth. You better figure things out. No drama for Ghana! And oh, Lings-Raw, I’m not soup material. I’m heavenly. You would choke on me if Nana puts me in soup. You would chew more than you have ever dared. Leave your insatiable appetite out of my matters. Eh, you are looking very good lately!

As I watched the play, lost deeply in thoughts, my beloved grandchildren interrupted, lovingly. Thoughts of White-Dove Royale lingered on with the words, God’s peace I bring to you! But I snapped out of the zone with words of Zora Neale Hurston, the celebrated African American novelist and anthropologist, one of my favourite authors, buzzing in my head. In particular, her highly acclaimed novel, “Their eyes were watching God” enveloped me. If you are a Zora lover, you know that when she grabs you, you submit. So I gave in to her voice and let her inform my understanding of the play.

To Ghanaians who were alive, even if they were not yet politically conscious at the time, any memories of the PNDC, the much-touted revolutionary era, take us into what Zora would call an “infinity of conscious pain.” Last Monday, members of the National Peace Council, led by Cardinal Appiah-Turkson, the Catholic Archbishop of Cape Coast, visited the former Flt Lt Rawlings of the PNDC, who morphed into President Rawlings and founder of the NDC, and then by default became Ex-President Rawlings to discuss, matters of peace in the December elections. He was quoted as asserting, with crass impunity, that “there is so much injustice in the country” and set conditions for peace to prevail.

Such words from him scrape old wounds which years have not healed. Injustice? What injustices didn’t this country not suffer under his revolution? Do we even need to play-back proceedings of ‘Reconciliation’ hearings? Injustice should not be like beauty which lies in the eyes of the beholder. Fortunately, no misfortune of collective amnesia has occurred.

Zora again: “There is a basin in the mind where words float around on thought and thought on sound and sight. Then there is a depth of thought untouched by words, and deeper still a gulf of formless feelings untouched by thought.” Despite the fast decreasing life-span of Ghanaians, there are still citizens alive who remember the terror, the callousness, the tables with women being whipped for selling milk above the “control price” with crowds looking on, the stray bullets that passed through homes, the deaths, those lost forever and unaccounted for, and the many other atrocities.

Such memories continue to float in the basin of the mind but to maintain sanity, the memories are simply left as formless feelings without thought and words. If you are religious, if you believe in anything higher above the ordinariness of your humanity, there is the temptation to simply drop on your knees and forget that you are there! Then, in a deep prayer without words, you plead to God, “Father, protect Ghana. Give us grace to continue. Be our guide. Forgive us our trespasses.” Afterwards, you awkwardly sweep yourself off your knees, already drooling at the mouth, toss yourself on the bed, and continue the sleep.

Zora again: “There are years that ask questions and years that answer.” Why in the world is there a political party with the Rawlings of AFRC/PNDC fame as founder and father? On the verges of the sweaty maddening crowd and high anxieties of electioneering campaigning, why is Rawlings still so much at centre stage of Ghana’s politics? Wasn’t the almost two decades of his post-colonial rule from the slave castle just about enough? When will he get tired and permit Ghana to figure things out, relieving us from his grip? Is he more Ghanaian than the rest of us? Doesn’t he also have just one vote? Why is Rawlings the person to be setting conditions for peace in this country? Fact: Rawlings has over-stayed his time in Ghana’s politics.

What is and who is a ‘Social Democrat’? How do we know one when we see one? Along the same line of questioning – What is the ‘Danquah-Busia Tradition’ and ‘property-owning democracy’? What happens to the many wretched poor of the land left in the stinky cracks of properties? Ouch! What is the meaning of these jargons and what are their implications for our democracy and for our future as a nation-state as we struggle to transcend our challenges?

I’m choking with questions without answers. But I’ll stay put without answers and simply float with Zora who said, “No matter how far a person can go, the horizon is till way beyond you.”

+233-208286817; dorisdartey@yahoo.com

We don’t need a corpse to have a funeral

Death, corpses and funerals; probably, no-go topics to pursue. But this week, we will go after one of them – the trend of extended refrigeration of corpses and allowing decomposition to occur before burial. Let’s yank this stinky matter up to the surface and shoot it straight so we can resolve this increasingly ridiculous phenomenon in our society.

On the surface, this topic appears to be a gloomy subject matter but it is one of the run-away issues that is going down, sinking fast, degenerating, and needs to be knocked right back up. Come with me please, for a brief but cold examination of this matter. I will be gentle. “I promise on my honour, to be…”

You are born. You live. You die. That is the order of nature. Imagine trying to delay nature by delaying child birth! Picture this: all tactics unethical and unnatural adopted to delay a pregnant woman from giving birth because the family is not ready for a grand “out-dooring.”

A husband tells his wife: “Akos, please wait for two months for my back-pay to enable us organize an impressive welcoming for the baby.” We do not do that. Yet, we have unquestioningly adopted the ridiculous habit of pushing the dead into refrigerators for prolonged periods, while we plan elaborate burials and funerals. That is unnatural. It is unsanitary. We forget that it is not called a “corpse” for nothing! A corpse is not useful or viable no matter how much we try to force it.

We place the dead very high on the agenda, soak in grief and compassion to undo our very purpose for living. We heighten the drama and immediacy of the dead by holding on to the corpse. This might be a way to stay in touch with our own mortality while we trivialize our lives. On the subconscious level, it could be our excuse designed to rob us of the opportunity to live and to thrive.

Muslims seem to have a better grip over this matter; Christians are in a sorry state. Wiser counsel must therefore prevail. Although Muslims have access to the same refrigeration opportunities, they promptly bury their dead. Surprisingly, the two religions are sibling faiths that originated from the same region of the world. Ghana is a predominantly Christian country; some even pride themselves to be super-Christians. The church and Christiandom must therefore initiate a national conversation on this subject matter and come up with solutions.

Enduring Questions: What is the matter with us Christians in Ghana? What kind of Christianity is this? What kind of civilization is this? Why are our Christian leaders condoning this? Why do we use funerals to show off non-existent wealth instead of investing in the education of children, our future? Why do we prolong mourning and suffering for the living? On a deeper level, what does that say about us as a people? Isn’t it about time, as a country, we did a cost-benefit analysis of the effects of the funeral craze on national development?

We did not use to wait forever to bury our dead. In the past, you died and loved ones scurried around to bury you. Then later, your funeral was planned and loved ones from far and near travelled for the funeral rites to say final farewells. We did not use to stare at decomposing faces in their stinky grand-standing last-show just to bury them. This increasingly ridiculous act is uncivilized, to say the least. It is NOT our culture. Or, has it become our NEW culture?

We have now invented a funeral torpedo that is eating us up. The need for a corpse to organize a funeral has become amplified. The balance has tipped from ridiculous love for corpses and funerals to downright abuse. Some corpses are kept for months and years, while the senseless grand planning and posturing continues, stressing out loved ones whose responsibility it is to finance a funeral

The typical excuse given is: “Let’s keep the corpse for a while so we can find the money.” That’s a cock-and-bull excuse because delaying a burial only increases the cost and complexity of the funeral. Some extended family members and leeches gladly use it as an ideal opportunity to move in to suck dry the bereaved relatives.

Stories abound. If you buried a relative promptly without doing the forever waiting, you stand the risk of being insulted: “When your father died, didn’t you bury him hurriedly in just a month like a goat?” To which you are not supposed to have a defence. One month of freezing a corpse should in itself be an abominable act but now it is about the minimum. That, in no doubt, signifies a sad deterioration and rottenness in our Christian culture.

A POPE has died in very recent memory. He was buried within five days. Yes, the Pope! Pope John Paul II. More recently, operatic legend Luciano Pavarotti died and was buried within four days. Lest we forget: Jesus the Christ, the one we claim to fashion our lives after, was buried on the same day so he could rise on day three!

Technology appears to be the perpetrator – refrigeration to store corpses. Just because you can do something shouldn’t become the reason to do it! Refrigeration presents convenience, of course. In the so-called developed world where the refrigerator was invented, the dead are buried promptly, as should happen, unless there is the need to conduct forensic investigations into the cause of death. But we unashamedly abuse the refrigerator to clutch on to corpses. It is as if we try to live vicariously through the dead.

As a result, we attend funerals to mourn over de-frosted corpses, decaying corpses, stinky corpses, scary corpses, unidentifiable corpses, mutilated and deformed corpses as well as cases of refrigeration and preservation gone badly. Corpses are handled crudely in mortuaries, a phenomenon that takes away the dignity of the dead. It is abusive but the dead cannot speak for themselves. Let us therefore speak loudly for the dead and especially for us, since that is the way we are all going.

While the departed remains in the fridge, nothing much happens with and around living loved ones. The focus is shifted onto the dead. The living wait, perpetually entangled in grief, and drained by the extended funeral drama. The burial is what brings some closure.

We have short life spans. Probably, the logic of extended refrigeration of corpses lies in a deep-seated and unmet need to prolong our lives – after the fact! So if you lived for 46 years, your corpse could be kept for five more years. That quickly puts your age at time of burial at 51! Brilliant! We seem to forget that when you are gone, you are gone.

This trend gives me a certain premonition of an impending ridiculous future when things might degenerate further. Someday, every hamlet, every street, every family will need its own ultra-modern mortuary! Yes, mortuaries must be ultra-modern because it appears to be very important to us to refrigerate corpses for prolonged periods. We would even need to build many more mortuaries than hospitals. Family-heads will be in bigger business. Official job description: Funeral Directors!

+233-208286817; dorisdartey@yahoo.com

We don’t need a corpse to have a funeral

Death, corpses and funerals; probably, no-go topics to pursue. But this week, we will go after one of them – the trend of extended refrigeration of corpses and allowing decomposition to occur before burial. Let’s yank this stinky matter up to the surface and shoot it straight so we can resolve this increasingly ridiculous phenomenon in our society.

On the surface, this topic appears to be a gloomy subject matter but it is one of the run-away issues that is going down, sinking fast, degenerating, and needs to be knocked right back up. Come with me please, for a brief but cold examination of this matter. I will be gentle. “I promise on my honour, to be…”

You are born. You live. You die. That is the order of nature. Imagine trying to delay nature by delaying child birth! Picture this: all tactics unethical and unnatural adopted to delay a pregnant woman from giving birth because the family is not ready for a grand “out-dooring.”

A husband tells his wife: “Akos, please wait for two months for my back-pay to enable us organize an impressive welcoming for the baby.” We do not do that. Yet, we have unquestioningly adopted the ridiculous habit of pushing the dead into refrigerators for prolonged periods, while we plan elaborate burials and funerals. That is unnatural. It is unsanitary. We forget that it is not called a “corpse” for nothing! A corpse is not useful or viable no matter how much we try to force it.

We place the dead very high on the agenda, soak in grief and compassion to undo our very purpose for living. We heighten the drama and immediacy of the dead by holding on to the corpse. This might be a way to stay in touch with our own mortality while we trivialize our lives. On the subconscious level, it could be our excuse designed to rob us of the opportunity to live and to thrive.

Muslims seem to have a better grip over this matter; Christians are in a sorry state. Wiser counsel must therefore prevail. Although Muslims have access to the same refrigeration opportunities, they promptly bury their dead. Surprisingly, the two religions are sibling faiths that originated from the same region of the world. Ghana is a predominantly Christian country; some even pride themselves to be super-Christians. The church and Christiandom must therefore initiate a national conversation on this subject matter and come up with solutions.

Enduring Questions: What is the matter with us Christians in Ghana? What kind of Christianity is this? What kind of civilization is this? Why are our Christian leaders condoning this? Why do we use funerals to show off non-existent wealth instead of investing in the education of children, our future? Why do we prolong mourning and suffering for the living? On a deeper level, what does that say about us as a people? Isn’t it about time, as a country, we did a cost-benefit analysis of the effects of the funeral craze on national development?

We did not use to wait forever to bury our dead. In the past, you died and loved ones scurried around to bury you. Then later, your funeral was planned and loved ones from far and near travelled for the funeral rites to say final farewells. We did not use to stare at decomposing faces in their stinky grand-standing last-show just to bury them. This increasingly ridiculous act is uncivilized, to say the least. It is NOT our culture. Or, has it become our NEW culture?

We have now invented a funeral torpedo that is eating us up. The need for a corpse to organize a funeral has become amplified. The balance has tipped from ridiculous love for corpses and funerals to downright abuse. Some corpses are kept for months and years, while the senseless grand planning and posturing continues, stressing out loved ones whose responsibility it is to finance a funeral

The typical excuse given is: “Let’s keep the corpse for a while so we can find the money.” That’s a cock-and-bull excuse because delaying a burial only increases the cost and complexity of the funeral. Some extended family members and leeches gladly use it as an ideal opportunity to move in to suck dry the bereaved relatives.

Stories abound. If you buried a relative promptly without doing the forever waiting, you stand the risk of being insulted: “When your father died, didn’t you bury him hurriedly in just a month like a goat?” To which you are not supposed to have a defence. One month of freezing a corpse should in itself be an abominable act but now it is about the minimum. That, in no doubt, signifies a sad deterioration and rottenness in our Christian culture.

A POPE has died in very recent memory. He was buried within five days. Yes, the Pope! Pope John Paul II. More recently, operatic legend Luciano Pavarotti died and was buried within four days. Lest we forget: Jesus the Christ, the one we claim to fashion our lives after, was buried on the same day so he could rise on day three!

Technology appears to be the perpetrator – refrigeration to store corpses. Just because you can do something shouldn’t become the reason to do it! Refrigeration presents convenience, of course. In the so-called developed world where the refrigerator was invented, the dead are buried promptly, as should happen, unless there is the need to conduct forensic investigations into the cause of death. But we unashamedly abuse the refrigerator to clutch on to corpses. It is as if we try to live vicariously through the dead.

As a result, we attend funerals to mourn over de-frosted corpses, decaying corpses, stinky corpses, scary corpses, unidentifiable corpses, mutilated and deformed corpses as well as cases of refrigeration and preservation gone badly. Corpses are handled crudely in mortuaries, a phenomenon that takes away the dignity of the dead. It is abusive but the dead cannot speak for themselves. Let us therefore speak loudly for the dead and especially for us, since that is the way we are all going.

While the departed remains in the fridge, nothing much happens with and around living loved ones. The focus is shifted onto the dead. The living wait, perpetually entangled in grief, and drained by the extended funeral drama. The burial is what brings some closure.

We have short life spans. Probably, the logic of extended refrigeration of corpses lies in a deep-seated and unmet need to prolong our lives – after the fact! So if you lived for 46 years, your corpse could be kept for five more years. That quickly puts your age at time of burial at 51! Brilliant! We seem to forget that when you are gone, you are gone.

This trend gives me a certain premonition of an impending ridiculous future when things might degenerate further. Someday, every hamlet, every street, every family will need its own ultra-modern mortuary! Yes, mortuaries must be ultra-modern because it appears to be very important to us to refrigerate corpses for prolonged periods. We would even need to build many more mortuaries than hospitals. Family-heads will be in bigger business. Official job description: Funeral Directors!

+233-208286817; dorisdartey@yahoo.com

THOUGHTS OF PRESIDENTIAL PALACES

Last Monday morning, two symbolic and historic events occurred on the Ghana and US sides of the mighty Atlantic Ocean. They were both presidential and palatial in character. And, they both left me mesmerized.

On the US side of the east Atlantic slave-receiving coast, in Washington DC, the president-elect with Kenyan ancestry was guest of out-going President Bush. It was an official tour of the 200 year-old White House as a first step in what would be a smooth transition from the war-weary Bush presidency to the high-octane global expectancy Obama presidency. The occasion was for Obama to have a feel and taste of what would become home next January. It was a beautiful show of democracy in practice.

On the Ghana side of the former Atlantic slave-trading coast in Accra, a newly constructed imposing edifice, a palace christened Golden Jubilee House, was unveiled. Built at the ruins of Osagyefo Kwame Nkrumah’s Flagstaff House, the occasion was a time for politicians, foreign diplomats, public servants, Chiefs and Queens, and anyone with a known middle-name, to get a feel and taste of the palace before it is handed over to the winner of the December 7 elections.

There is something in a name. By not naming the edifice Flagstaff Palace to show the up-grade in status from a house to a palace but rather Golden Jubilee House, the namers sought to acknowledge and remind Ghana of our post-colonial stature, especially the grandeur celebration last year of the golden jubilee anniversary dubbed Ghana@50. So why not call it Golden Jubilee Palace since that thing is not a house? I know a house and that edifice is not a house!

Regarding documentation: What are the facts and figures of the palace? For instance, what is the square kilometres of land size, the significance of various emblems, and names of rooms? Especially, the genie should be let out of the bottle on the total cost of constructing this sprawling palace. The bare facts should include the estimated versus the actual cost, and reasons. Detailed interesting information should be compiled and updated regularly and made available online because we are in an e-world.

A few minutes of Internet searches bring out interesting detailed facts, figures and photographs of official residences and government offices of various countries. For instance, the history of Britain’s Number 10 Downing Street is traced to how Sir George Downing, the notorious spy of Oliver Cromwell, purchased a parcel of land in 1654 to build townhouses for the rich. The story unfolds with intriguing details of how the property became the seat of government. Similar details about the White House, the Kremlin in Moscow and the Elysee Palace in Paris are also available online. Paintings and photographs on walls as well as details of interesting peculiarities of these seats of government give the reader a satisfying experience close to a virtual tour.

Take the White House for instance. Considered a national treasure, it has 132 rooms, 32 bathrooms, 412 doors, 147 windows, seven staircases, three elevators, five full-time chefs and receives approximately 6,000 visitors a day. It was built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted sandstone. Even the addition of a ramp during the Clinton presidency for wheelchair access is described.

Regardless of the direction and intensity of our feelings towards the construction of the palace, it is now our new national treasure and is almost ready for habitation, co-habitation and many other activities in between. On a purely silly note, some other records I’ll be fascinated to have access to are who will be the first to do the following in the palace: to kiss, play hanky-panky, get drunk at nonsense degree, engage in scuffles or shouting matches, receive a slap from a high-powered official, fight and be beaten up, choke on free food nyafu-nyafu, fall down and have injuries, and so on.

We will be watching the real first occupant of the palace. He would not just have a palace but crude oil for bonus to oil the creaky machinery of government and anything else that floats his boat. So our House must be maintained – regularly. And, he shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that the majority of our people exist in stinky poverty. For a damn broke third world country, we have, without a doubt, played up our hands against the back-drop of crude oily dreams and international begging.

If I was a tax-paying citizen of a ‘donor country’, I would be getting more than a little upset on hearing the news that Ghana has built a presidential palace to the cost over $30 million. I would stage a demonstration just about now, the ‘we-no-go-sit-down-make-we-send-them-any-more-money-everyday’ kind of demonstration. My upset would be a result of knowing that I, a first or second World country citizen, sacrifice tax money and kindness to give to third world countries – to the poor of the world – while they build palaces.

But on the flip side, as a citizen of Ghana and for the fun of it, I am tickled that we too have a palace. Damn it! It’s about time, even in poverty. Apart from our own sickening foolishness of corruption and misplaced priorities, part of the reason for our developmental funk can be laid squarely at the doorsteps of failed destructive interventionist policies of 1st world countries who took us through slavery, colonialism, Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) and as if to say, “oops, we messed you up again”, they attempted to sooth our putrid wounds with a lousy balm through the laughable Program of Action to Mitigate the Social Cost of Adjustment (PAMSCAD).

I am holding my breath though, that we stick to simplicity and good taste with furnishings and decorations of the palace. An unscientific opinion suggests a tendency of formerly oppressed people to resort to a certain ridiculous level of tasteless opulence in excessive fashion. Our presidential palace should be spared such imprudent tastelessness borne out of low-cost poverty mind-set. Remember, less is more!

During last Monday’s inaugural ceremony to ‘open’ the palace, senseless traffic reared its ugly head. Although the ceremony was staged inside the sprawling compound, the road in front of the palace running from the 37 Military Hospital to the Afrikiko Restaurant junction was closed for several hours, causing challenging traffic jams all around. Drivers had to struggle through awkward diversions in Nima, Kanda and many other ‘ways-and-means’ roads. Is that a sign of things to come when business begins in earnest at the palace? Such a situation will more than irritate and annoy ordinary folks, particularly the many forgotten ‘little people’ who will never have the privilege to enter the palace to drink tea – sorry oh – cocoa.

Now that we have this controversial palace matter out of the way with guarantees that the privileged of the land have a cushy place to suit their need for opulence and ego, and probably enhance our national pride, we must now move on to tackle our funky developmental challenges. For starters, here are a few of such issues that should be positioned at true front and centre: the decreasing average life expectancy, low-quality health care delivery system, stinky environmental sanitation, urban slums, dying rural areas, and street children who are mortgaging their youthful lives to sell inconsequential Chinese-made products by roadsides.

dorisdartey@yahoo.com

The Land where fridges, computers and ships come to die

My land is an e-graveyard. The whole 238,540 square kilometres of it is a potential e-graveyard; waiting. My land is one of those countries nicknamed “Third World” where refrigerators, freezers, computers, car engines, anything electronics and even ships come to die. It’s only in graveyards that things not needed, things that have expired and all life in them has run out, are dumped and forgotten. Human beings, when dead, end up in graveyards. All other things have graveyards too. But we don’t have proper graveyards for the e-waste we welcome onto our land.

Apart from Kumasi and Tamale, we don’t have proper landfills. We still use the ‘bola’ of old, dumping sites where we heap and dump whatever. We could have continued safely on that path if our bola had continued to consist of left over food. But we are developing; so is our bola – sadly. Our garbage has moved into an un-chartered territory. We are in an e-world, a world in which electronics reign supreme. And non-biodegradable plastics too! The bola of an e-world is e-waste and it’s tough. E-waste does not decompose. And, it’s toxic.

I have heard it said that the poor person’s garbage is really ‘refuse’ because it consists of end-of-life-cycle stuff which have been refused and abandoned. No wonder other words for refuse are garbage, trash, waste and filth. To find much that is of any further use in a poor person’s garbage, you must search through, hard – and in filth. On the contrary, the rich person’s ‘refuse’ consists of things discarded out of a privileged place of abundance.

Poverty stinks! In some ways, it makes sense to buy used things. When you don’t have a whole lot of money, used things make so much sense. But sadly, used things do not last; cheap things are expensive. Used things are not meant to last because they are other people’s rejects, with shortened life-spans.

The word ‘bola’ originated from the colonial era when garbage was incinerated. When e-waste is burnt, it lets out toxic chemicals into the atmosphere. E-waste is not your grandmother’s ‘bola.’ It is heavy duty and serious stuff. It is a killer. It is toxic for the land, toxic for the air, toxic for water bodies, toxic across the board.

A news headline in the Vancouver Sun of Canada on December 22, 2006 reads: “Dangerous waste bound for China is intercepted.” This story details the outcome of investigations into illegal shipment of e-waste from Canada to China. Read the next few paragraphs from the news story to get the full picture.

“A joint investigation by federal agencies has exposed Canada's dirty role as a major illegal exporter of hazardous waste to developing countries. Fifty containers loaded with about 500,000 kg of metal and plastic scrap destined for China and Hong Kong were seized at the Port of Vancouver.
Environment Canada and the Canada Border Services Agency report that the electronic waste seized from 27 Canadian companies since November 2005 came from across Canada, but mainly Quebec and Ontario.
The waste included thousands of computer monitors containing products such as lead, along with lead-acid batteries, and fluorescent lamp ballasts containing polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), proven to be toxic to both the environment and humans. "This is the tip of the iceberg," Emmanuel Mendoza, enforcement engineer for Environment Canada, said in an interview. "We're dealing with a very large, relatively unknown industry."

Since I read this story online, I’ve become more awakened to electronic garbage scattering our road-sides, for sale. Why are we allowing our beloved country to become a graveyard to rich and mighty nations?

Poverty stinks! Oh, you don’t believe me? Then come, let me take you on an imaginary journey through three scenarios in our 51 year-old Ghana.

Scenario Number 1: Kojo Mensah lives in Germany. During a visit to Ghana, his cousin Michael Oppong assures him that they can both thrive if they go into the importation of used electronics. So Mensah begins to ship a few used TVs which he located from disposal points in Hamburg. In no time, the business grew. He began to ship increasing quantities of used TV, refrigerators, deep freezers, computers, radios and even cooking utensils. The collection comprised of items in varied conditions: old models, some in good condition but with limited shelf-life remaining, some broken down but are deemed repairable once ingenious Ghanaians lay hands on them.

Case Number 2: Three old computer gifts are presented to an elementary school in Tuobodom. The Chiefs and people gather, decorated in this election season by the DCE who is eager to topple the Parliamentarian. At a little ceremony, the computers are presented amidst media spectacle to provide the needed cheap publicity to embellish an equally cheap gift.

(Specifics mentioned in Cases 1 and 2 are made up, but plausible).

Case Number 3: This scenario is real. Standing at the Tema New Town beach, looking over the ocean from the fish sellers, you see a bizarre collection of ships. Then, it strikes you that the colour of the ocean is abnormal. It’s dirty brownish, not gorgeous ocean blue. You take a moment to process the odd colour. Then it strikes you again: the ships are abandoned; and they are rusting. The ocean, without a choice, has taken on the colour of the rusting ships. The ocean has been turned into a graveyard. End of story. You want to scream but somehow, you maintain your sanity.

Why are we allowing our beloved country to become a potential graveyard to the rich and mighty nations? The size of Ghana is a finite patch of land. The mighty Atlantic Ocean is rudely stealing some pieces away and we can’t do much to stop it. So why not protect what we have?

Considering the speed at which technology is advancing, this problem is truly alarming. New models of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) and other electronics are rolled out at break-neck speed. By the time new models arrive on the global market-place, they have already been rendered old because newer, faster, slicker and better models are developed in rapid succession. That increases our vulnerability of becoming the dumping grounds of new and yet not so new technologies.

And, those abandoned ships: whose responsibility is it to guard and protect our ocean from being turned into graveyards?

We were colonized once, painfully. We, the locals as well as our slave-offspring African Diasporan citizens of the world are yet to fully recover from the trauma of the dehumanizing experiences. We could probably glean some wisdom from ancient Greek mythology in the expression, "Beware of Greeks bearing gifts." The cunning Odysseus devised the idea of the ‘Trojan Horse’ as a gift; a gift that turned out to be packed with soldiers who conquered the city of Troy at night.

We are becoming a mule to carry the e-waste of the developed world. If they can’t figure out how to deal with the ‘remains’ of their technology, the least they can do is to leave us in our low-tech world.

Where are the elders of this town? Political parties and presidential candidates who are eager to take over the mantle of leadership of Ghana – what say thou you?

dorisdartey@yahoo.com

Effective Communication and Leadership Skills in the Obama Campaign

Today, Obama-lovers in the USA, Canada, Indonesia, France, Mexico, Germany, Kenya, Ghana, Ireland, Japan, Australia, Netherlands and indeed across the globe, will keep fingers tightly crossed as they wait for America to vote for hope to be realized in the most audacious manner. There are many who will stay up through ungodly hours in different time zones, glued to TV or radio sets, waiting for the results of the US elections to roll in and to celebrate a likely Obama victory.

His exotic origins have played up in his favour. He is bi-racial, born out of the black groin of Africa by way of Kenya and the white womb of Kansas. He spent five of his formative years in Indonesia and grew up in Hawaii. A cross-cultural exposure early in his life makes him such a unique citizen of the world.

But as is always the case, nature ends somewhere and nurture takes over. Obama looks good and sounds good. He is a gorgeous heart-throb, eloquent and charismatic. He projects a sweet disposition and temperament. That is nature.

Nurture steps in in various aspects of the Obama story. The success of Obama’s campaign is not a result of luck. For a person with Hussein for middle name and the eerie resemblance of his first name to Osama (aka Bin Laden), he is an unlikely person to come this close to the USA presidency in a post 9/11 era. Instead, Obama appears to be a classic case of preparation meeting opportunity. He is a phenomenal public speaker who can draw in listeners, placing them in awe. He seems to have an uncanny ability to shake off challenges and move on, unscathed.

Obama has campaigned on the rhetoric of change. What change? Change from a global weariness of President Bush. First, is the spill-over of the weakened US economy into the global market-place. Also, the Bush wars have been exhausting. There is the quagmire of Iraq, the war-fatigue in Afghanistan but worst of all, there is the open-ended ‘War on Terror’. So Obama launched the change rhetoric as a message strategy, and stuck to it.

Obama’s training might hold part of the secret to his successful campaign. After graduating from the prestigious Harvard Law School, instead of taking a high-flying corporate legal job, he went into the trenches in the rough south-side of Chicago as a Community Organizer. Not surprisingly, his campaign has been organized as a well-oiled engine of a nation-wide grass-roots movement. Through effective organizing, characterized by superior ground operation, he grew a large army of passionate professional volunteers who then carried the campaign to the masses. He ignited interest in voting, getting people who have never voted to register. His campaign did not just become a movement. He himself has become a strong brand.

The initial results of his magic showed when he won the primaries in lily-white Iowa. That improbable success signified his first early major boost of energy to mark him as someone who could transcend race. He has since effectively applied the techniques of organizing from the microcosm up to the macrocosm.

Obama is an e-candidate who, like no other politician anywhere, has used cutting-edge communications technology to buttress his bid for public office. Through the Internet, he raised unprecedented record-breaking funds. Other Internet tools like blogs and social networking has helped fuel Obama’s campaign further. As an Internet savvy politician, Obama had a clear advantage of Internet presence over his older rival who is Internet illiterate.

He accepted his party’s presidential nomination August 28 to coincide with the 40th anniversary of the famous Rev Martin Luther King Jr “I have a dream speech”. As if the event and coincidence were not enough, the 84,000 Congress participants were asked to send text messages to the campaign and to make phone calls to people they know. This was another innovative fund-raising, data gathering and voter mobilization drive.

In the past week, to bring a fitting closure to a well-run e-campaign, Obama run 700 thirty minute infomercials (advertisements) simultaneously everyday on several TV channels during prime time evening shows. Through this strategy, Obama’s campaign sucked as much publicity oxygen as was needed to the end.

Beyond technology, his human touch has propelled his rise. After all, leadership is multi-faceted; it’s both software and hardware. During the long-drawn out primaries of his party, especially the long stretch tussle between him and Senator Hillary Clinton, it appeared as if the relationship between him and the powerful Clinton couple had been bruised beyond healing. Yet, healing occurred and he and the Clinton’s have campaigned side-by-side. The repaired relationship might have drawn many disgruntled Clinton supporters to him.

Obama run a tight campaign based on sensible strategic and tactical moves. Although he had twice as many campaign offices as McCain and definitely more than any other US presidential candidate in history, he held things together like a tight ship. There was clarity on who says what to whom, not a lose collection of characters who wield tags as spokespersons.

It’s not as if Obama’s campaign hit no road-blocks. Problems are part of living. It’s how we manage them that determine success or failure. Negative news suck out oxygen from campaigns. In politics, when there are miss-steps or rivals hit you hard with rumours, you don’t stay in denial, praying for the scandals to vanish. The best strategy is to respond to the accusations promptly and clearly, leaving no or little room for doubt.

One of the big hitters that almost destroyed Obama’s campaign was when his pastor of over twenty years, Jeremiah Wright, made explosive racist and hateful pronouncements. True to form, Obama used the opportunity to make a major public speech to address the delicate issue of race in America. In the speech, he made some key self-disclosures to expose his own frailty. By so doing, he dealt with the difficult matter and moved on.

Throughout the campaign, even as his rock star persona grew, various aspects of his personality continued to show. He has a funny side.

In the two years, Obama has greyed fast. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “The reward of a thing well done is to have done it.” Obama has worked really hard. Through his campaign, he put the power of effective communication and leadership tools to the test. His meteoric rise has not been by accident. The messianic unmeasured expectations of him are nerve-racking though. What if, as President Obama, he violates expectations? Then, the disappointments will follow. Then…….

The Obama campaign offers several lessons. They include:
• Campaigns must be organized in a methodical fashion, grounded in research, well-planned, well-executed and tightly-run, leaving little or nothing to chance.
• Have a profound, memorable message that is electorate-centred not candidate-centred. Stay on that message consistently. The main text, sub-text and mini-messages must all tie in to the central message theme.
• Begin campaigns with a strong grass-roots organization as a firm base, and later, crown it with a massive media blitz that efficiently and effectively uses a combination of multiple cutting-edge and old communication tools. Creativity pays.
• A strong professional team is priceless.
• Charisma is a bonus; Good public speaking skills precious.
• Candidates must remember that people are watching them and their team – all the time. Don’t unravel in public, in plain view.
• Manage internal crises internally and quickly. When faced with scandals, deal with them head on; be truthful. Playing games and not clearing the air promptly can cost you – a lot.
• Elections are not ‘do or die’ events.
• Supporters should donate money to candidates and political party; not the other way round.
• Ending is as important as the beginning so go out with a bang!
• Have fun; keep things alive and remember that after all, you’re dealing with human beings. Being pleasant pays – a lot.

dorisdartey@yahoo.com