Voice form afar: The strife is over

"The strife is over; the battle done".
Ghanaians often sing when they bury the dead.
But is life really a battle? And is the victor's triumph won at death? To many Ghanaians the elections were a definitive life and death struggle but there they part company with Christian teaching.

Election victory is to many not a commemoration of spiritual and highest achievement but a unique opportunity to relax and enjoy the fruits of power and patronage. But if this country is to make real progress the victors in the elections should regard themselves as the real losers in that peace of mind which life struggles to achieve. They will have no lasting peace if they do their work well.

Most of us prayed for peaceful elections.
Now we should pray and work for that peace which would usher in economic and social development and true national progress.

And what is peace? At Christmas I cannot but remember Charles Dickens. In "Bleak House" Mr Chadband asks: "what is peace? Is it war? No. Is it strife? No". But peace follows war and wars end formally with peace treaties and peaceful undertakings. Strives also end in peaceful resolution of conflicts. And so are wars and strives necessary for peace? Are they the harbingers of peace? Recent events suggest that wars and strives are only the sad expression of man's folly.

We do however need some form of conflicts for human progress. But they are not the conflicts which assail reason and they are best resolved by the expression of ideas and ideals in dialogue. That is the sort of conflict which should have characterised the elections. There was something of it but there were too many unhelpful jibes at rivals.

Now is the time to have the real conflict -that of ideas. If the conflicts are real and the ultimate progress and development of Ghana, there would be a consensus on what to do, even if unanimity is not achieved.

To say that the future is not bright is an understatement. I was glad to hear the other day that cocoa prices were high despite the general decline in the prices of commodities. That is good news for our foreign exchange earnings. But the price of cocoa is high because there is not much cocoa around. And so it may be that we would not earn that much from cocoa after all.

Practically all the promises made at the elections depended on a growing economy. The economy should therefore engage the most serious attention of government-Parliament should see to it that policies are correct and probity and accountability prevail in implementation.

Parliamentarians should regard themselves as national- delegates and not party members. We pray that their endeavours will prosper. We pray that the President will always be actuated by the highest motives.

This is the time not to write or talk much. It is the time to ponder over the future and strive to faction it to valuable and rewarding ends.