More Soldiers Have Died in Coups in Ghana than in Warfare

A security specialist has claimed that the military has issued a warning to the civil government that they will take control of the country should the electoral commission fail to guarantee the security and stability of the country during and after the elections. The military public relations office was quick to debunk this claim, explaining that their position is to support the police to maintain security, upon the invitation of the latter. Nothing else.

But the whole thing is about the function and survival of the military establishment itself: The military has no power to intervene in the political affairs of this country at any time unless with the sole purpose of stabilizing and supporting the civil authority to govern. And it is better for them to get this duty right and clear in their own interest. Because any time the military gets involved in the political fortunes of this country, they suffer far more severe casualties than if they had remained quietly in their barracks.

I said a long time ago that the 1966 coup was the only justifiable and justified military intervention in the political life of this country because the military got rid of a patent dictator who had abolished political pluralism and who had no time limits. Even so, so much blood was spilled on the side of the military. Kotoka, was assassinated, and those who assassinated him were in turn assassinated. Afrifa was later dragged from his farms and shot like a dog! This is not counting the actual number of soldiers who died on account of the action itself.

The 1966 coup was followed by the bloodless coup of 1972, led by General Kutu Acheampong. His principle as a trained soldier and officer was to avoid spilling blood at all costs. But when the time came, he and at least eight of those senior officers of his government were shot like dogs, including General FWK Akuffo who got rid of Acheampong with the aim of restoring civil rule to the country. These fine officers and gentlemen all died solely for their role in coups.

Many soldiers who took part in that pusche in 1979 also died by the gun, having helped Rawlings, a single penniless person, to come to power. Apart from his three months of the terror which saw many soldiers face the gun or imprisoned, most of those who were persecuted and killed comprised those he used to grab power. To wit, after they installed a powerless guy with no authority in power, he turned on them and killed and destroyed them all.

We saw the same MO play out in December of 1981. Within a short period of less than two years, the blood of those soldiers who helped Rawlings to power was wantonly spilled, with most his accomplices fleeing the country. Gyiwa, Akatapore, Adubuga, come to mind.

Ironically, no civilians faced the firing squad, and very few faced exile, far below the rate at which these soldiers themselves were killed or driven out of the country.

It follows therefore that more soldiers have died in coups than the number that has died in any action protecting the country. If the soldiers organize to overthrow the government, it doesn’t augur well for them. Because they put their lives on the line for a single ambitious individual who later turns around to squander their lives. Nothing comes of their toil to usurp the civil authority, and in the end, they suffer the bane of their own rebellion and waste their lives and that of their families for their treasonable adventurism.

So that all that the military should do to create their own internal restraint and awareness is to refer to their own history of political involvement, to count their casualties in coups. And thereafter publish the names of those dead imprisoned or exiled or destroyed due to coups. If they take time to post the pictures of those fine colleagues that became the casualties of coup….or even those whose lives were destroyed…..if they count the whereabouts of these people’s children and their families right now, they should be able to ask, “What was it all about?”

Nobody had time to save the soldiers from themselves. And nobody has to beg or coach or persuade or convince them to stay in their barracks. They always have the choice to do whatever they want to do. But it suffices to state here that a person of average intelligence seeks his best interest and acts to protect themselves. They have sworn an oath to protect their country with their lives. And that imposes on them a duty that is higher than their own survival. But nobody is asking them to hallucinate that there is any redemptive purpose beyond this oath. Nobody has asked that a Messiah emerges from their midst to aid the country to do right.

If they leave their duties to create chaos via coups, they will install a monster who will cannibalize their ranks. And in the end, they will become their own fallen victims of their own treasonable adventurism.

Nobody will fall as casualties of coups, except the soldiers themselves.