Thursday, September 17, 2009
Kwame Nkrumah - Hard Target
Jan 2, 1964. Kwame Nkrumah walks the grounds of Flagstaff House with personal guards and ‘trusted’ cops aplenty. An assassin (who sent him?) squeezes off a bullet and misses. Salifu Dagarti throws the Prez down, and probably saves his life. For reward, the next bullet drills cleanly through Salifu’s loyal skull. Onlookers remain bystanders as the assassin chases after the President into a kitchen. Prez is screaming, but no help arrives. Kwame Nkrumah personally wrestles and overpowers a gun-toting assassin. On this day, he’s 54 years and 125 days old! But he escapes with only a facial bite!
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*Wow* Great recount. This was a very close call indeed. I can seen how all the assassination attempts may have contributed to Osagyefo becoming more authoritarian and paranoid.
ReplyDeleteThe inept assassin, Ametewee, aimed thrice at the President. His fourth attempt at cocking (as they say)the rifle, was thwarted. He had meant to kill the President on New Year's day but did not get a clean shot. He got his chance the next day, and for some chilling reason it appeared as if some of those around were expecting a hit. Ametewee claimed later on in court that his intention was not to kill Salifu Dagarti but the Presdient, and so he should not be held liable for the death of his eventual victim.
ReplyDeleteWow! very interesting Osagyefo was a boxer too? I love this man! Thanks Nana keep them coming! I am hosting a celebration of his life on Lincoln Universitys(his alma mater) radio station and these stories are going to be told! Me likey!
ReplyDeleteso who in his right senses after these incidents wouldn't institute the PDA. In fact i would have done worse than that. It is pure hypocrisy for people to assume that the PDA is stupid. If you try on several occasion to assassinate your president you must be prepared to face the consequences. He who calls the tune pays the piper. Let's face the fact...any body would have become paranoid under such circumstances. we are a bunch of hypocrites who see good only after the person is dead.
ReplyDelete@ Nana Fredua, the attempts on Nkrumah's life were unjusitifiable. However, unlike you I would not say PDA was unjustifiable. There is no excuse for it. Read the provisions carefully. A person could be held in prison for 5 years without a charge, without a trial for his own protection or for suspicion of having criminal designs. This gives the man in charge the liberty to imprison you for the simple reason that he does not like the size of your head, under the pretext that your incarceration is for your own good. The danger inherent in this far outweighs the paranoia (justifiable or otherwise) of a dictator seeking to protect his life. American Presidents are shot at regularly, yet the whole nation is not made to suffer because of the acts or would be acts of assassins. PDA? Just a pretext to kill political opposition and ensure one's irremovability.
ReplyDeleteWow- I'm so ashamed. I don't know anything about Kwame Nkrumah. Can anyone recommend any good reads on this man? Whether good, bad or irrelevant. I want to know all of it. Nana Yaw.... any ideas?
ReplyDeleteThanks
...and to put it in perspective, the attempts on Nkrumah's life began when he banned all political parties and declared Ghana a one party state and effectively made himself President for life!! In these circumstances he clearly made himself irremovable except being shot at or killed. His political opposition held the hope of beating him at elections some day, but when he killed that dream by banning them, he drove them underground and imprisoned hundreds of them without trial. And they fought back by trying to kill him. Were they justified? May be not. But was the PDA justified? In my opinion, CERTAINLY NOT!!! Kwame Nkrumah may have been a great man, but if greatness is measured in dictatorship and cult creation, I humbly decline that invitation to grant him that accolade.
ReplyDeleteWow, Nana Yaw. I'm sure I'm not the only one learning something new on reading this but you make the history lesson so enjoyable. Thrilling read!
ReplyDeleteAby, it is a chicken-and-egg situation really. Did the assassination attempts happen first, or did Nkrumah's one-party, life-president, political-enemy-elimination happen first? I don't know. But I can do the research.
ReplyDeleteYes, Kiz, they stood by as if they were expecting a hit. I so would not like to be in that position. It also means I should not do anything to put me in that position.
ReplyDeleteKwadwo Ofori-Mensah, thanks for coming by. There are a couple of posts more to come, I think.
ReplyDeleteNana F-A, you seem to know the answer to the chicken-and-egg conundrum. Which came first? Assassination attempts of political-opponent elimination?
ReplyDeleteHmm, Kiz and Nana F-A.
ReplyDeleteUm, Raine, I will get back to you on this, ok?
ReplyDeleteKiz, I think you support the theory that the chicken came before the egg.
ReplyDeleteAwww, Maya, thank you sooo much.
ReplyDeleteAnd here I was, thinking I had amassed all to know about this revolutionary Africa man. I blame Ghanaians for the way he eventually left office. Where would Ghana have been by now?
ReplyDelete@ Nana Yaw: It just appears to me that he created conditions which seemed (at least, in the opinion of the assassins) to necessitate the attempts on his life. Indeed, the PDA itself was enacted in 1958 (when he was Prime Minister), just a year after independence and before the bomb attempt on his life at Kulungugu.
ReplyDeleteNow I'm risking being annoying. But pardon me another quick example: After the failed bomb incident, Adamafio and Ako Adjei, his own Ministers, were tried for complicity in the affair. The only evidence of substance against them was that they appeared to know a bomb was to be detonated because they chose to ride in cars driven way behind that of the President. They were acquitted by the Court. Nkrumah then dismissed all the 3 judges (including the Chief Justice) and appointed fresh judges to re-try them. Your guess is right - the second set of freshly appointed judges convicted them based on the same thin-ice "evidence". Now, what happened to the rule against double jeopardy and fairness?
ReplyDeleteIt's really difficult to say, Pen Powder. Ghana may have been like Malaysia. But, then again, Ghana may have been like Zimbabwe!
ReplyDeleteThat about the Preventive Detection Act is true, Kiz. I honestly think Kwame Nkrumah has a fair amount of paranoia.
ReplyDeleteYou are certainly not being annoying, Kiz. All views are openly encouraged on this blog.
ReplyDelete@Kissi,
ReplyDeleteNkrumah was no dictator?
how do you come to that conclusion?
indeed, democracy is not only about multi-party participation! or?
i'm rather enojoying your points and i'd be glad if you prove to me that Nkrumah was a dictator?
i'm personally no fun of PDA, because i believe like the foolish chieftain system it marks off as one of those dehumanizing things we inflict on ourselves.
but for joy and annoyance's sake, let us see how Nkrumah merits the description of a dictator?????????????
@Kissi,
ReplyDeletewhile i wait for your response hopefully! o how a man hopes for love!
let us get it clear that the idea that Nkrumah was the one who created conditions for attacks on his life is not true!
i'm no fixed man who believes in only one way for development-i don't mind whether we choose to group as tribes or as a nation of different tribes or even as a continent of different races---(a man must choose something though based on opportunities and i choose a United Continent instead of these funny nations we have)--- but let history speak for itself.
a closer look at the conditions at the time--a freshly born nation with a number of people who were against the idea of a 'unity' state: like the 'tribal' parties and their machinations (NLM, the Northern Peoples Party, the Ewe opposition, the Ga opposition etc.)...
in fact, by the time the first coup attempt was made on Nkrumah's govt; just about a year after independence (does the time ring a bell?) there was no PDA.
such were the conditions!
so to say Nkrumah created conditions for attacks on his life perhaps is only true if we are to consider the fact that if he had not come back to Ghana to forward his already clear agenda of fighting for the decolonization of Africa he would have exposed himself to bombs and bullets of the narrow minded ones!
and that would not be different from saying Kennedy who was assassinated should have lived a private life instead of putting himself up to be elected as the president of the US.
You are all mising the point. A dictatorship was absolutely necessary; for the ultimate good of the people and the continent. How could you have a "democracy" when the populace were so uninformed, ignorant and had virtually no awareness of africa's true situation with regards to the ex-colonialists? Well, the colonialists were successful....and see where africa is now; the "annus mundi"; balkanized into tiny, economically and socially unviable nation states. With a weak and incredibly stupid populace ruled by pathological thieves who themselves are in the pay of their white masters in europe and america.
ReplyDelete