September 2026 did not start on a kind note.
Why? Radio news in the early hours of Wednesday, September 2, 2026 stated that there had been an RTA involving a Ford Transit bus and Toyota Hiace bus on the Accra-Aflao Road with an unknown number of casualties.
This was confirmed as day broke with, “13 dead, 18 critically injured at Sege Ada Highway crash,” as the gory headline on Graphic Online.
Earlier on September 1, 2026, violent clashes over a land dispute between Effutu and Gomoa ethnic groups at New Winneba resulted in three dead and 17 injured.
Then on September 2, at Akropong, a clash between students of Okuapeman SHS and next-door neighbours, Mount Sinai SHS, resulted in injuries to six students.
As I asked myself why all this violence, my mind went back to my article in February 2025 in the Daily Graphic/Peace FM titled, “Violence! Violence! Violence?” partly reproduced below.
To say that the last week of January into the first week of February 2025 was eventful might be an understatement.
Perhaps, “violent” will be a more appropriate word.
• At Accra Academy SHS, a machete-wielding student was caught on tape dangerously flogging new students with the side of a machete.
General Secretary of the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT) Thomas Musah Tanko said: “As a nation, we have lost character and conscience.
We are now training people with knowledge, but when it comes to character and conscience, we have fallen short.
If care is not taken, we will all be in trouble in the coming years.
This is something policymakers must seriously address.”
• At Salaga SHS, Savannah Region, a violent clash on February 4th between students left a student seriously injured.
The police arrested twenty students.
• In Accra, a violent clash between students of the Kinbu SHS and the Accra Technical Training Centre (ATTC) resulted in the death of a student.
• At Nsoatre on Sunday, February 2, 2025, a football league match between Nsoatreman FC and visiting Kumasi Asante Kotoko went violent, resulting in the stabbing to death of Francis Frimpong, a supporter of Kotoko.
• Perhaps, the negative “icing on the cake,” though no death was recorded, was the violence on Thursday, January 30, 2025, at Parliament House during the Appointment Committee’s vetting of nominees, broadcast live to the whole world.
Described variously as “disgraceful, regrettable, shameful, despicable,” etc., our “Honourables” dishonourably converted the chamber into a boxing ring, not only engaging in fisticuffs but also destroying furniture and electronic gadgets.
This re-enactment of the violent events in the chamber on the night of January 7, 2021 reminded me of my article of January 2021 titled “Pandemonium in Democracy’s Citadels.” I stated:
In his poem “Paradise Lost” of 1667 on the sacking of Satan by God to Hell, the English poet John Milton invented the word “Pandemonium,” as the capital of Hell. He described Pandemonium as the “high capital of Satan and his peers!”
January 2021 started on a whirlwind note in two capitals, Washington, D.C., and Accra! Almost simultaneously, there was pandemonium in the Capitol, Washington, DC, on January 6, 2021 and Parliament, Accra, early January 7, 2021.
The world’s leading exponent of democracy, the USA, and Africa’s beacon of democracy, Ghana, both came out badly bruised, losing their cherished reputations as democracies par excellence.
In Washington, D.C., the iconic Capitol Hill on which the US Congress stands was stormed by President Trump supporters. Incited by Trump, they were to prevent the certification by Congress of Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 US Presidential elections.
With Congress in session, thousands of Trump supporters breached security, stormed the Capitol, destroying things and desecrating Congress with faecal matter.
Early January 7, 2021, in Accra, Ghanaians watched in disbelief and shock as our Parliament Chamber was converted into a blend of a rugby stadium and a boxing/wrestling ring, where MPs violently displayed their snatching, sprinting, slapping, stampeding, and sitting-on-lap skills.
In the confusion, armed soldiers and police also entered the Chamber!
On the first sitting of the 8th Parliament on January 15, 2021, the Speaker strongly reprimanded the MPs for their “unruly behaviour” and “despicable conduct!” He warned he would have none of that on his watch.
Lessons
Words like “unbelievable, shameful, disgraceful” have described events in Parliament on January 7, 2021.
To say we fell from grace to grass may be an understatement. Disappointed African friends who hitherto held Ghana in high esteem teasingly welcomed us to the league of Thomas Hobbes’ jungle-law-parliaments where animalistic aggressiveness and violence reign over restraint and decorum.
A venerable statesman opined that Parliament is now perceived as a goldmine where people go not to serve, but to make money.
Otherwise, why should parliamentarians ask for ex gratia of GH¢ 400,000 each after four years in Parliament, when they see nothing wrong with teachers and nurses being given less than GH¢10,000 gratuity after 30 years’ service?
What is the point in violently attaining power, knowing that violence begets violence, with Ghana thrown into anarchy?
Discussion
Frustrated by all the violence, is it any wonder that elder statesman Sam Okudzeto said, “Ghana has become a nation of hooligans!”
How come our SHSs have become breeding grounds not only for violence, but murder in some cases?
The stabbing to death of a student of the O’Reilly SHS by a colleague in September 2024 is still fresh in our minds.
In the name of human rights, discipline, which straightened us as children, has been relegated to the background with dire consequences.
After the night of violence on January 7, 2021, did Ghanaians not overwhelmingly say “never again” to such violence?
On curbing violence, as I was told in Uganda, where I lived in 2008/2009, when I asked why the constant spate of killings, ???
“When people know they can get away with murder because nothing will happen to them as the law does not work, they will kill with impunity.
But when they know they will also be killed for murder because the law works, they will not kill!”
Is the democracy we are practising, with its “winner takes all” (WTA) and highly polarising mentality where about half the population is alienated as “opposition” at any one time, the best for Ghana?
Are we waiting for an MP to be killed in the chamber before we think of options such as Proportional Representation (PR), as is the case in the Scandinavian countries?
This electoral system gives parties seats in Parliament in proportion to the votes they receive.
Perhaps, Nana Dr SKB Asante, who led the Committee of Experts that made proposals for debate by the 258-member Consultative Assembly in 1991-1992, and is thus described as the “father of the 1992 Constitution,” can educate Ghanaians on Proportional Representation as thought of by his Committee of Experts.
While over 130 countries select their MPs by PR/modified, only 55 use the First Pass the post/Winner Takes All.
May decency, selflessness and patriotism be our guide as MPs/leaders and not needless machoism, as our children learn from us!
May the souls of the lost lives RIP!
Discussion
Leadership, it is said is cause, the rest is effect! Again, leadership is not a popularity contest.
Until our leaders selflessly bite the bullet for the long-term development of Ghana, and not factor themselves into the equation to win the next elections at all cost, greed/corruption, galamsey and its consequences of poisoning our water bodies/environmental degradation, schools under trees, poor roads/RTAs etc will continue to plague us.
Leadership, lead by example/integrity/humility! Fellow Ghanaians, wake up!
The writer is a former CEO, African Peace Support Trainers Association Nairobi, Kenya; Council Chairman, Family Health University, Teshie, Accra. E-mail:
