Today marks the 53rd anniversary of what is undoubtedly the greatest thing to have happened to our dear country — Independence.
On such an auspicious occasion, it is altogether proper that we take stock of our 53 years of nationhood to see where we have not done well so that we can chart a path that will bring us more prosperity.
The period just before and after March 6, 1957 held high hopes for the new Ghana. Our path towards independence had not been as torturous and acrimonious as that of other countries and our colonial masters did bequeath to us some legacies, both financial and material, which put the new nation state in good stead for a great take-off.
And, indeed, we did start well, under the inspirational leadership of our first President, Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah.
Under him, every sector of the economy saw accelerated development — talk about the setting up of industries to produce what we needed and employ school leavers, schools in every corner of the country to educate the youth, the Workers Brigade to make agriculture the mainstay of our economy to produce enough to feed the people and the industries, massive infrastructural development as per the roads, harbours, buildings and dams to produce electricity to power industries, etc.
Nkrumah as a person might have had his foibles, but we dare say that he did enough to put the country on an even keel for accelerated development.
The sorry state in which the country finds itself today can, in a sense, be attributed to the failure of successive governments to acknowledge what their predecessors did in order to build on them.
The tendency to demonise what predecessor governments did, coupled with the acrimonious nature of take-overs, has tended to set the clock of progress back several years and so the countries with whom we gained independence, such as South Korea and Malaysia, have left us far behind in terms of the provision of the needs of the people.
But that is not to say that as a country we have not chalked up any successes at all. We have been able to produce a UN Secretary-General in the person of Kofi Annan and there are many other Ghanaians who have occupied and are still occupying high-profile positions in international and sub-regional bodies.
Our soldiers and policemen have done us proud in international peacekeeping operations and in the past 17 years our democracy has become the toast of the international community and talked about in superlatives.
Moreover, in spite of our individual differences that come about from the way we carry out our politics, our dear country has remained intact, so far, and as things stand now we don’t have any reason to believe that the status quo will change for us to cease to be the oasis of peace that we have always been in the sub-region.
But we could still do better if we resolve, as a country, to do away with pettiness, selfishness, corruption indiscipline and squabbles. These are tendencies that keep us away from our goals and aspirations.
From now onwards, we should all resolve to put Mother Ghana first in all our endeavours, individually and collectively, and we believe that in no time the progress we so desire and which has eluded us all this while will be ours.
The Daily Graphic wishes all Ghanaians a happy independence anniversary and may the Good Lord continue to shower His blessings on our President, other leaders and all Ghanaians.
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