Countries of the World/COUNTRYS.BIN/dp/0142/01424.txt

Text File | 1991-06-25 | 34KB | 561 lines

$Unique_ID{COW01424}
$Pretitle{353}
$Title{Ghana
Chapter 3C.   Independent Ghana}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{nkrumah
cpp
government
party
power
national
nkrumah's
opposition
major
african}
$Date{1970}
$Log{}
Country:     Ghana
Book:        Area Handbook for Ghana
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1970

Chapter 3C.   Independent Ghana

     On August 3, 1956, the new assembly passed a motion authorizing the
government to request independence within the British Commonwealth. The
opposition did not attend the debate, and the vote was unanimous. The British
government accepted this motion as clearly representing a reasonable majority;
a bill to give the Gold Coast its independence was introduced into the British
Parliament and approved, and the date of independence was fixed.

     On March 6, 1957, the 113th anniversary of the Bond of 1844, the Gold
Coast became the independent state of Ghana. Sir Charles Arden-Clarke, who had
been governor since 1949, became the first governor general. The Legislative
Assembly became the National Assembly. Ghana was admitted as a member of the
United Nations two days after it attained independence.

The Strengthening of the Government's Hand

     The constitution in force at independence provided protection against
easy amendment of a number of its clauses. It also granted a voice to the
regionalism and traditionalism of the chiefs and their tribal councils by
providing for the creation of regional assemblies. No bill amending the
entrenched clauses of the constitution or affecting the powers of the regional
bodies or the privileges of the chiefs could become law except by a two-thirds
vote of the National Assembly and majority approval in two-thirds of the
regional assemblies. The local CPP supporters gained control of all regional
assemblies, however, in part because the opposition parties chose to boycott
the elections to these bodies. The Nkrumah government, which already had a
two-thirds majority in the National Assembly, promptly secured passage of the
Constitution (Repeal of Restrictions) Act of 1958. The act removed the special
entrenchment protection clause in the constitution and left the National
Assembly with the power to effect any constitutional change it wished at the
will of its CPP majority.

     One of the early acts of the now unfettered National Assembly was the
outright abolition of the regional assemblies. Another was the dilution of the
clauses in the constitution designed to ensure a nonpolitical and competitive
civil service. This alteration allowed Nkrumah to freely appoint his followers
to positions throughout the upper ranks of the government service.

     The major law strengthening the government's power was the Preventive
Detention Act, which allowed Nkrumah to imprison an opponent at will,
initially for up to five years (later extended to ten), without either
publishing the prisoner's name or the charges against him and without allowing
the seized person any recourse to the courts. By 1964 the number of political
prisoners held under the act was estimated at between 400 and 2,000 persons.

     The Preventive Detention Act was preceded and supplemented by the
Deportation Act of 1957, which allowed the government to deport any
noncitizens resident in Ghana who opposed the regime and also allowed it
to void the citizenship of any person who could not prove he was born in
Ghana of Ghanaian parentage. Deportation could be carried out solely on the
grounds that the subject was "disaffected toward the Government of Ghana."
The act was used almost immediately to deport two leaders of the opposition
Moslem Association Party.

Intraparty Dynamics

     Even as it achieved its first victory at the polls in 1954, the CPP
had begun to experience dissension within its ranks. Lower level leaders
and whole local elements, disappointed either by the party stands on political
or economic questions, particularly regarding the question of federal versus
centralized control, or by personal failures to obtain high-ranking posts,
left to join or to form opposition parties. For example, eighteen of the
twenty-one members of the executive body of the NLM, the CPP's major opponent,
were former CPP members. One of the NLM's major elements was the Asante Youth
Association, which had originally been formed by the CPP to lead its
membership drive among the urban Ashanti.

     In addition, the rigidity of executive domination within the CPP had
already become apparent enough by 1956 to antagonize many supporters. It was
the prime cause of the formation of the Ga Standfast Association (Ga Shifmo
Kpee) among the highly urbanized Ga tribal group centered in Accra. These
people had initially been the strongest supporters of the CPP and Nkrumah.
They broke with the party over the issue of intraparty democracy and cronyism,
as did some labor and veterans' groups. This was the cause of the CPP's poor
turnout in the Accra Capital District and the Eastern Region in the 1956
election. No opposition candidates attractive to these urban defectors
presented themselves in time to contest the campaign, however.

     As a mass party with over 20 percent of the country's population enrolled
as members, the CPP found that all the major divisions within the country were
being reflected in the party. In order to counterbalance them, control over
the party was made more rigid. Regional organizations initially strong enough
to present alternative power centers to the national leadership, were
subordinated through the concentration of power in the hands of regional
secretaries appointed and paid by the Central Committee. The creation of local
units of the party's youth and women's and labor organizations divided the
popular support that had formerly been given to the local party branches.

     As early as 1955 Nkrumah had gained the power necessary to dominate the
party executive. He had been acclaimed chairman of the party for life and, as
life chairman, had also gained the right to choose a majority of the members
of the Central Committee. By 1956 he also had ultimate control over the
selection of candidates for elective offices.

     After an administrative reorganization of the CPP in 1959, which created
a national secretariat with departments directly paralleling those of the
government administration, Nkrumah also took the position of general secretary
of the CPP. The leaders of the party-dominated labor and farmer organizations
were given representation in the national executive at the time, thus giving
Nkrumah direct access to their decisionmaking as well. Under the 1958
amendment to the constitution, all power was legally vested in a parliament
controlled by the tightly disciplined CPP delegation. By 1958 leadership of
the party was organizationally in the hands of the Central Committee, selected
and dominated by Nkrumah. Thus, by 1959 a governing structure had been created
with Nkrumah at the pinnacle and all reins of power in his hands.

Party Fronts

     From its beginnings, a major portion of the CPP's support had been
developed by secondary organizations-the youth groups, women's societies,
cooperative associations, farmers' unions, labor unions, and the
Ex-servicemen's League. Only the labor unions and the Ex-servicemen's League
were capable of presenting any challenge to the party.

     The CPP replaced the league with a government-controlled body, the Ghana
Legion. All women's and youth organizations, even the Young Women's Christian
Association and the Boy Scouts, were abolished and replaced by party
auxiliaries. The National Association of Socialist Students Organization was
created to instruct older students in the ideas of Nkrumah, although this body
was later abolished because its leadership became a center of left-wing
opposition to Nkrumah policies. Its place was officially taken by the Kwame
Nkrumah Ideological Institute at Winneba, a center to which all senior
government officials and