Ugh! – What A Year! By Cameron Duodu

IN my childhood days, I used to puzzle a great deal at how we celebrated Christmas.

It was supposed to be a joyful time during which children were bought new clothes; given enormous quantities of biscuits, toffee and other sweets; and – best of all – served delicious chicken-groundnut soup.

Children were encouraged to welcome the “new year” in, on 24^th December, with a groundswell of noise – our parents managed to cough up money to buy us noise-making crackers (or “rockets”) as well as toy guns.

Ok, not every toy that was given to us worked. But we could have a good go at making our own guns. The most common were made with padlock keys – those with holes in them. We scraped the phosphorus off the sides of match-boxes and mixed it with the flame-making potassium chlorate in the match-head. We then placed the concoction in the hole. Next, we found a piece of iron, placed it firmly on top of the stuff in the hole, and struck it hard with a stone or big stick or whatever. BOOM! or PAH! would come the sound.-- depending on how expertly our contraption had been constructed.

Sometimes, the key split and hurt our fingers; occasionally, the explosion would emit smoke and stuff into our eyes. But even the hurt was sort of delightful. For we had had fun conceiving of and carrying out the whole exercise.

But on Christmas Day itself, many of the adults in our households would spoil everything by mourning for those they had lost during the year. I particularly remember the year my maternal grandmother died. My mother, who, to my knowledge, never tasted alcohol, got herself drunk and sat on a mat crying for her mother, most of the day. We kids were completely taken aback. We vacated home and went to find solace in the company of our friends.

I have been entertaining the same feeling of disappointment this Christmas season. On the one hand, I feel grateful that God has protected me and my immediate family from harm during the past year. But on the other hand, I feel rotten because some of the people who have left this world in 2020 were known to me and I feel as if I've been robbed of a part of myself.

First comes DR JONES OFORI ATTA, the former Deputy Minister and Member of Parliament, who left us on 30 November 2020, at the age of 86.

It is impossible to convey to those who did not know him, the sort of character Jones was .

He was charm incarnate – always smiling, very soft-spoken, and totally urbane. He exemplified the sort of culture being who could only have been brought up in the palace of a great King – in this case, Nana Sir Ofori Atta The First, Okyenhene; Kwaebibiremhene; Etwie a odi sika atomprada; Kurotwiamansa a onam seseaa ase woso biribiribiribiri...”

[King of The Virgin Forest; The Leopard Who spends unadulterated gold; The Leopard that treads the thickets with might, and causes them to shake biribiribiribiri!]

Jones respected everyone. He was generous to a fault. He could make everyone laugh. And he talked economics with good sense in a country where everyone has more or less pretended to be an economics expert at one time or another, not because they wanted to, but because circumstances forced everyone to obey the empirical law: “Nkran ha abrabɔ, economics nkoaaa!” [life in Accra is dominated by economic calculations.]

My late friend, Kwame Adu Adade of the Estate Manager's office at the University of Ghana, Legon, related to me the effect Jones had on a group of workers as they watched a televised debate on the “Abbott Agreement” between Dr Jones Ofori Atta and Mr R S Amegashie of the then College of Administration, in 1967:

“For some reason, the issue had become entangled with ethnic feelings in some people, “ Kwame Adu told me. “Therefore, my workers were divided – some on the side of Amegashie and some on Jones' side. Then Jones declared: “I went to Achimota School – on Ghana Government scholarship. I went to the University of Ottawa, in Canada – on Ghana Government scholarship. And I think it's time I repaid that privileges, by using the knowledge I acquired, to oppose an Agreement that seeks to rob the people of Ghana and hand over the fruits of their investment in the GIHOC Pharmaceuticals Industry to a foreign company!” – when Jones said this (Kwame Adu related to me) “one of those who had hitherto supported Amegashie, asked sadly, “Ao Sylvan! But why?”

Jones is gone. But not before the Ghanaian State awarded him The Order of the Volta.

No, we cannot bring him back. But we can continue to honour his name and keep his memory alive.

M'Adamfo Pa Akwasi, Da Yie!

[Fare Thee Well, My Good Friend Akwasi]

----0----

Dr Jones Ofori Atta reached the ripe old age of 86. But we do still mourn him. What about a young man who only spent 48 years on this earth?

E K Nyame once wrote a song which says: “Minim sɛ abranteɛ bewu a, anka mamma wiase!....” [If I'd known that a young man could die, I wouldn't have come into the world!”]

This song has never left my lips ever since I heard that Atu Kwamena Mould, eldest son of my friend, Mrs Sati Occran, had suddenly betaken himself to the nether world.

Atu was a happy-go-lucky young man whose natural friendliness was enhanced by a striking physical appearance. My last sight of him was when, as a growing boy, he spent a nice with my family in south-east London some years ago. Since then, I'd only heard good things about him.

First, that he'd been able to build a first-class technically-savvy company that had been able to build sea defences in some parts the Western Region.

And second, that he shared my own love of sports cars.

I was told that Atu drove around Accra in a Lamborghini! Now, that's a car for sports car enthusiasts to really respect! Apparently, he also owned a some Ferraris to boot! To those who do not know what is attractive about super-cars, that would mean nothing. But to proper sports car aficionados, that means having climbed to the top of the mountain. Good taste. Safe driving. Luxurious motoring. Bags of power. In other words, self-satisfaction.

Atu died, unmarried, at the age of 48. Imagine what he would have missed in life had he not discovered sports cars to entertain and liven him?

Atu da yie, wae.

Sati, George, and all the Family, be glad that he didn't suffer for too long.