Protecting our sovereignty
I have heard grumblings from different quarters about a subtle attempt by a foreign power to meddle in our internal affairs. This is in reference to a tweet emanating from the US Embassy in Accra.
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It is true we are a sovereign nation. At least, we changed our name from Gold Coast to Ghana at independence. We have a national flag, a national pledge and an anthem, whose words we could hardly recite or sing.
We saw it at the recent World Cup tournament in Brazil. While the players of other national teams sang their national anthems with nationalistic passion, our players only hummed our anthem as it was being played from the loud speakers.
Straightaway, the motive for our participation was more of commercial and self-interest rather than nationalistic. We all saw the result of that type of attitude. We attracted international attention not for our brand of football which the tournament was about, but for our crave for money, which overrides all patriotic considerations on the part of players and officials.
Sacrifice
I agree with President John Mahama that we need to make sacrifices today that would bring us positive and a better tomorrow. That, for example, would mean a deliberate policy that would cause a drastic reduction in our food imports so that, "we eat what we grow and grow what we eat".
In that case, it would not be a matter of individual choice, but a matter of national interest. It would mean ploughing a lot of resources (both funds, material and technical) into agriculture that would encourage and enhance food production for national consumption.
It would also mean reducing or eliminating certain frivolous imports, such as fake and artificial hairs, which do not only drain us but, unknown to most of us, add to our cultural enslavement. Where is the beauty and dignity of a woman who wants to be cherished and respected for her true identity if she buries her head in a dense forest of a ‘so-called’ Brazilian hair?
Leadership sacrifice
The greatest sacrifice must begin from the presidency, or for that matter, the government. We cannot claim we are poor when our presidential motorcade rivals that of the US president. We cannot convince anybody that we are short of funds when government officials and senior public servants make vintage and high-priced vehicles their standard choice.
Politics and public service, to many, have become alluring because once you get into that bracket, your economic and financial woes are over. The mission to serve becomes an obligation to be served. The culture of certain categories of public officials becoming a burden on the taxpayer must be seriously re-examined and tackled with all vigour.
Way forward
The only way to assert and protect our sovereignty is to religiously pursue a path of independence and self-reliance. You do not go on reckless begging and expect respect.
Some landlords can be callous and disrespectful because they see the tenant as a failure or vulnerable at best. Every sovereign nation, no matter its economic status, should be able to provide a modest residence for its political head according to its resources.
As we gird our loins to defend our national sovereignty, the president of our republic is proudly being housed in a mansion financed and built by another sovereign country called India, a country that is older than Ghana by just 10 years, having gained political independence in 1947 from the same British colonial masters.
Only God could tell if our president, whether in the office, bedroom or even in the bathroom, is covered and not being seen on some computers hiding somewhere, knowing the magic of scientific advancement these days.
Apart from the presidential palace, another two of our national sensitive institutions have benefited from the largess of a foreign benefactor. I am referring to the ministries of Defence and Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, which were financed and built by the Chinese government.
Those who could remember the experience of the US in the Cold War era, when their embassy building in Moscow was heavily bugged, would admit that the last place to seek or accept foreign assistance for is the construction and equipping of a defence or foreign affairs ministry. We have done both.
Presently, the only road in the national capital which takes great pride apart from the Accra-Tema Motorway is the George Walker Bush Expressway, alias N1. This beautiful roadwork is a gift from the taxpayers of the US. The numerous accidents associated with this road have largely to do with our inability to raise funds for our side of the bargain, to provide facilities like overhead bridges to check knockdowns.
Meanwhile, we are waiting for funding under a new compact of the US-sponsored Millenium Challenge Account before we would build roads.
We could not design and build a modern road network for our national capital but we could use our national resources on frivolities or divert them into private pockets.
So where is our muscle as a sovereign nation? None. There is a popular saying here that, "Poor man no vex". How can we, when we have portrayed ourselves as very poor and always ready to dance to the tune of others?
