Ghana Has Silenced Its Own Akwaaba At Kotoka-And We Are Selling It In London

As a Pan-Africanist and Tourism Advocate. I believe Ghana is not just a country. Ghana is home. Home for every Black soul scattered by slavery, by colonialism, by hardship.

So when I saw a post by a brother, Ben Kwesi Annan (Tour Guide), that cultural welcome performances at Kotoka International Airport have been suspended without notice, I did not see it as just a tourism issue. I saw it as a betrayal of Pan-Africanism.

What does Akwaaba mean? It is not a word. It is a covenant. It says: "You have suffered out there. You have been called a minority out there. But here, you are majority. Here, you are home."

That covenant is sealed with a drum at the airport. When our sister lands from Baltimore after 400 years of her ancestors leaving through Elmina, and she hears that drum at Kotoka, she cries. Because for the first time, Africa has spoken to her directly.

And we have suspended it?
Without a press release? Without consulting tour operators? Without talking to the cultural troupes whose ancestors invented those drums?

Meanwhile, in the same week, Ghana is at World Travel Market in London. We are there with a big stand, beating the same drums we have banned at home, telling white people and our own diaspora: Come to Ghana. Come feel Akwaaba.

Our comrades in government, this is double standards. You cannot sell Black Star Experience in London and kill Black Star Experience at Kotoka.

I am a Pan-Africanist, so let me be blunt:
You are telling President John Dramani Mahama's Diaspora Affairs Office to bring the diaspora home, but the home has locked its front door. You are telling Hon. Abla Dzifa Gomashie, a culture woman, to use culture as oil, but you have capped the oil well at the airport.

If Kenya can manage Masai dancers at Jomo Kenyatta Airport, if Rwanda can manage Intore dancers at Kigali Airport, why can't Ghana, the Black Star of Africa, manage Adowa and Borborbor at Kotoka?

If the issue is indiscipline, regulate. If it is extortion, punish. If it is overcrowding, create a schedule and a small fee. Pan-Africanism is not lawlessness. We will comply.

But what you cannot do is silence the drum.
That drum at Kotoka feeds families in Jamestown, in Chorkor, in La. Those are not just performers. They are custodians of our culture. When you ban them without notice, you tell the Ghanaian youth that our culture has no value, but the suit and tie at the airport does.

I did not experience this suspension myself. I saw Ben Kwesi Annan's post and it woke me up. And as a Pan-Africanist and Tourism Advocate, I cannot be quiet.

So this is my appeal, in my own name, Nana Yaw Boakye Yiadom Opoku Agyemang (N.Y.B.Y.O.A.):

To the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts, to Ghana Airports Company Limited, to Ghana Tourism Authority, to the Diaspora Affairs Office:

Bring back the Akwaaba drums at Kotoka. Now. Not tomorrow.

Because if Ghana's airport cannot welcome its own Black family home, then who will? If we lose Akwaaba at arrival, we have lost the soul of Return.

And without soul, there is no tourism. There is no Pan-Africanism. There is only an empty airport.

Akwaaba must live at Kotoka.
SeLaH!!!
Pan- Africanist Nana Yaw Boakye Yiadom Opoku Agyemang [N.Y.B.Y.O.A.]

Executive Director
Let Truth Be Told Alliance [L.T.B.T.A.]
+233243065430 | [email protected]