Africa Rising: Would Ghana Be an Exception to a Military Coup?

Perhaps, the greatest protest (coup) in the human history was that in South Vietnam on June 10, 1963 when a Buddhist monk named Thich Quang Duc set himself ablaze and in a lotus meditating posture burnt to ashes without screaming and without blinking an eye, to register the displeasure of the Buddhists community about the anachronistic economic mismanagement, burdensome corruption, and religious jingoism by the Vietnamese government led by Ngo Dinh Diem.

Like Thich Quang Duc and his fellow Vietnamese Buddhists, is Africa taking its own path of self-immolation in protest against self-centered, self-preserving, self-perpetuating, self-serving, and self-aggrandizing Cabalocracy defined by Patrick Obaigbon of Nigeria as government of the cabal, by the cabal, and for the cabal?

Apparently, the embarrassing silence of reputable Africa's organizations such as the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), The African Union (AU) and other stomach or mere-food-for-us and useless organizations of their kind that are usually quiet with tacit approval of constitutional criminality when there's an electoral coup by incumbent political parties and presidents, are the sequel of events that are triggering the military takes over we are witnessing today.

In his Book entitled: “Everything is Fucked”, Mark Manson averts that the first rule of geopolitical theory in international politics says that when you have two total pieces of shit as leaders sharing a border with each other, millions of people perish." These are leaders who have made shit-hold of their own counties former President Donald Trump referred to in addressing African countries.

Suffice it to accept that the earlier military coups in the aftermath of attainment of independence in Africa was a direct result of unnecessary but hungry-related dick-size competition among the African elites, the recent coups are triggered by genuine concerns like that of the American Revolution of the 1770s, the French Revolution of 1789, the Easter Rising by the Irish people of 1916 in Dublin, and the not too distant past ago Arab Revolution also known as the Arab Spring that started in Tunisia when a vegetables seller set himself afire in protest against the high cost of living, corruption, nauseating incompetence, and police brutality in that country - Tunisia - which later culminated in waking up almost all the rest of the Arab world to rise up in arms to revolt against incompetent, corrupt, and most brutal Arab leaders in the Middle East.

The question many intellectuals are now asking is, with the recent coups sweeping across the sub region of West Africa recently joined by Gabon, is it the turn for an African Revolution where Africans would rise against very incompetent criminals masquerading as their leaders who have been stealing in arrears and in advance for their generations yet unborn leading to the economic knockout of their countries?

Ideally and clearly, it is not a mere big dick-measuring contest that is responsible for the emerging military juntaship Africa is witnessing in recent times which has been predicted to snowball out of control soonest rather than later. Majority of people have become rather bitter about the present economic nosedive. And it may need just a spark to amend the history of Ghana’s republican status, too. That’s why the upcoming demonstration by the opposition and AriseGhana needs to be carefully managed by the police like “killing a mosquito on the scrotum”.

You see, an African proverb says that “the world doesn’t change its color to match the chameleon it’s the chameleon that chnages its skin to match the earth. Thus, what is happening in the West African Sub-region recently joined by Gabon in Central Africa with regards to the unfolding political turmoil, would not force Ghana to undergo similar challenges, but the country is at liberty to deflect or reflect what the rest of Africa is projecting to be experiencing soonest by some political deep thinkers. And Ghana may most likely choose to change its spots like the proverbial leopard by mimicking the recent coups fever hysteria. This is because, when the long mouth of the dog is insulted, certainly, the crocodile in the pond would be affected.

What has caused this warmly embraced wind of political upheavals in Burkina Faso, Guinea, Mali, Niger, and Gabon, has been in tenfold badly hitting Ghana. Economic mismanagement, naked nepotism, “electoral coups”, sleazes and corruption, have been part and parcel of the Ghanaian political space. And if there should be any African country whose military must depose political actors of their country in defending and saving the masses due to economic calamity, malfeasance, and corruption, it must be Ghana whose economy and currency have been adjudged the worst performing in the whole wide world of late with its Central Bank joining the museum of failed and collapsed Central Banks of the world.

Fellow Ghanaians, the crippling, depressing, paralyzing, and suffocating hunger ravaging and savaging our land is undoubtedly a result of having completely an accursed individuals at the helm of our affairs; individuals God does not approve of to manage our affairs, but by virtue of unrestrained access to vital national institutions, they have foisted themselves upon us by occupying most crucial and cutting-edge offices in the land perfecting their art of looting and gangsterism.

These are individuals who must have been crucified, hanged or beheaded under any simple Shariah law system, or at least, must have been rotting away in jail for the clandestine plots and activities they undertook on their way to political power. But in our collective wisdom or stupidity, these political outcast and misfits are still walking among us and even continue to plunder our resources to the utter silence of everyone. What do we think God would do? With this degree of unspeakable tragedy of suffering and hunger, isn't God certainly proving to us that those in charge of us do not belong there even if we choose to deodorant their mess?

Should Ghanaians fight against their own enemies in this government or allow God do the fighting on their behalf?

As a first Sub-Saharan African country to have attained independence from Great Britain, Ghana is often adjudged as the bastion of liberalism, a beacon of peace, a democratic engineer, and a harbinger of constitutionalism and rule of law. And for many people, Ghana has not been hit by a major revolt or any coup despite this unforgettable and unforgivable mismanagement of their economy due to these democratic ideals of the country, and the fact that Ghana has often been seen as a gateway to democracy in Africa.

But it appears the recent addresses by both the president, Nana Akufo Addo, and the former President, John Dramani Mahama, have revealed why Ghanaians may have decided to allow the continuation of this incompetence. It’s not about any democratic endurance. The good people of this country have realized that the president has obviously thrown in the towel and lost all hope in his own leadership acumen. And the clarion call made by him asking citizens to wait for an economic and political savior from his party’s primaries to navigate Ghana out of this economic doldrums was what exposed the president’s lost of all hope in himself.

Meanwhile, the former President, and In Sha Allah, Ghana’s next president come 7 January 2025, has sought to keep the hope of Ghanaians alive when he renewed his pledge for a visionary and selfless leadership to marshal us out of the leadership miscarriage the Akufo Addo government has created.

This is indeed the difference between leaders and economic phishers and fraudsters. Hope!

Is it not embarrassing that the government now shifts from asking for citizens’ prayers for the economy to supplication for a stable and civilian rule? Anyone surprised? Clearly, this latter call made by the president, was actually intended for the opposite effect. The government seems itching to be toppled and overthrown by the military.

How can a government continue to do the same thing and expect different results? The mismanagement hasn’t been stopped because those responsible for that mess are still at post and yet the government wants a way out of the it meanwhile it doesn’t want a military take over? In mathematics, "negative-negative" is positive. The government is basically and indirectly inviting and reminding the military what they can do when leadership of a country becomes dysfunctional.

But one can easily see where this contradiction is emanating from and one the government is speaking from both sides of its months. Having run the economy and the country aground out of sheer financial recklessness, the only last thing that can save the face of Akufo Addo and slightly cover his shame and mess, would be a disruption of his government.

However, the military seems to have realized how desperate the government needs a military bailout after an IMF bailout is worsening the economic situation of Ghanaians. And the last thing even the dumbest, most clueless and unintelligent military would do, is to overthrow such an economic ticking time bomb!

So, they, the military, have decided to shelve their guns and to allow their Commander-in-Chief who later metamorphosized into a rather Commander-in-Thief of Delta and Invisible Forces, in the last seven years, and his thieving government, to suffer as a lesson to anyone nursing to steal an election in a brazen manner the NPP and president Akufo Addo did in the last election (2020).

Indeed, the hawk that snatches the bone of the dog shall suffer with it. And our elders say the mourning of the dead is a warning to the living.

Indeed, this embarrassed and shameful government of president Akufo Addo is a warning to future political vultures, jackals and hyenas, who may be nursing plans to stealing an election that God may show up.

I predict the fleeing away by president Akufo Addo from the presidency. That is, Ghanaians must not be surprised to wake uo one morning to the news that our dear president has fled the country due to leadership failure. It shall be the most shameful way any leader can give up on his leadership. I can’t wait to witness that day.

Governance is a serious business indeed.
Ghana may not therefore be an exception to a military take over but no soldier is willing to involve himself in the management of this accursed government; and Ghanaians would allow God instead to humiliate and overthrow Akufo Addo who infiltrated our seat of government with the help of the highest custodian of our justice system.

God shall come for them, too. Including Jean Mensah.