Mills' Ghana and the purge of the big six

Gabby Asare Otchere-Darko, writer

A few courageous nationalists were, however, not deterred, but pressed on to form the United Gold Coast Convention which gave birth to the organized nationalist struggle for independence for our country.'

William Eugene Amoaka-Atta Gyampa Ofori Atta was born two years before his father, Alex Boakye Danquah was enstooled as the Omanhene of the Akyem Abuakwa State, in the Eastern Region of the Gold Coast. His mother was Oheneba Abena Obenwaa, daughter of an earlier king, Amoako Atta I, who welcomed the missionaries to Kyebi to set up at Obronikrom but later on fell out with them when their indoctrination was such that it disturbed the social order of allegiance to the stool, customs and traditions which maintained the Akyem Abuakwa state.

The boy, Kwasi Willie, attended Kyebi Government School from 1918-25. He left to continue his education at Mfantsipim Secondary School (1925-29) with his brother Aaron Ofori-Atta, but they were both transferred to the Prince of Wales College, Achimota, which his father (then Chairman of the Achimota College Council) was instrumental in establishing. His classmates included Edward Akufo-Addo and K Agbeli Gbedemeh - the first three candidates presented by the College for the Cambridge School Certificate examination in 1930. Two years later, William became the first senior prefect of Achimota.

Nationalism
Even as a student at Achimota, the young Willie's nationalism was apparent in his writings for the first daily newspaper in Ghana, the Times of West Africa, which was published by his uncle, J B Danquah. His nationalism and anti-imperialism at the time may not be that obvious even to those whose archival research leads them to the newspaper unless they look for the pen names Amoako Gyampa and Pro Pat Ria.

One of his students, K B Asante said on GTV's Talking Point  on 10th October 2010 - on the evening of the 100th anniversary of William Ofori-Atta's birth — that he was surprised Paa Willie lasted that long at Achimota as a teacher (1939-43) because of his fierce opposition to the colonial government at the time.

Paa Willie helped to make Achimota the centre for youth agitation, recruiting a new Achimota cadre of youths into active politics, and using both the Plato Club and J B Danquah's Gold Coast Youth Conference (1927-47) and its 'Wither are We Drifting?' speech series to send home the anti-colonial message.

In 1934, Willie was to accompany his father as private secretary, when Nana Ofori Atta I led a high-powered Gold Coast and Ashanti delegation to the United Kingdom to convey the protest of the people directly to the British Government against the Criminal Code (Amendment) Ordinance (commonly termed the Sedition Bill) and the Water Works Ordinance of 1934, which sought to charge city-dwellers for the consumption of pipe-borne water secured from outdoor stand-pipes.

According to a historical account, 'What the popular struggle to scuttle the water rate clearly revealed was the potential political strength of the masses when they were mobilized in opposition to an action which directly and adversely affected their best interest. The battle over the income tax and the earlier campaign against the Land Bill of 1897 had offered the same testimony…'

Indeed, on 17 February 1934, the Times of West Africa, believing itself to be threatened by repressive controls, had warned then that it was no coincidence that the water rate, which it claimed had been 'shelved in 1929 because of press criticism' was about to be revived in conjunction with a Sedition Bill. J B Danquah was joined in his opposition to the Sedition Bill by other vociferous anti-imperialist journalists like Nnamdi Azikwe, Bankole Awoonor Renner, R B Wuta-Ofei and I T A Wallace-Johnson — all great West African anti-colonial fighters (domiciled in the Gold Coast) at the time, who were united in their determination to protect press freedom in the region.

Moreover, the likes of K A Korsah, the Member for Cape Coast, during the Legislative Council debate of March 20, 1934, strongly denounced the proposed water bill as an 'ill-conceived and ill-timed' tax of sorts, which only went to confirm the administration's 'scant consideration for the sufferings of the people of this country.'

Nana Ofori-Atta gave the coup de grace with all nine African representatives on the Legislative Council voting against the proposed legislation. It was, however passed with official and unofficial European support, making it necessary for the delegation to be put together in May 1934 for the England trip.

Interestingly, among the delegation to England were also Edward Ochir Asafu-Adjaye and I K Agyeman, Nana Agyeman Konadu Rawlings' grandfather , who both represented the Ashanti Kotoko Society, Aku Korsah, Akilagpa Sawyerr and Frederick Victor Nanka Bruce, representing the Accra Ratepayers, and James Mercer, who represented the Western Region.

James Mercer was Ekwow Spio-Garbrah's grandfather, the father of his mother, Elizabeth Mercer. The famous gate at Adisadel College is named after his son, Elizabeth's brother, James Mercer II, first Ghanaian ambassador to Israel and China.

The delegation arrived back home on 12 September 1934. Unfortunately, James Mercer, a member of the delegation, was killed in an automobile accident shortly after they arrived in Great Britain and Nana Ofori-Atta and the team arranged for his burial in London before returning to Ghana.

But, the late Mr Mercer was not the only member of the delegation left in England. Danquah did not also return, opting to do research in the British Museum into the history and traditions of the Gold Coast and tracing its connection to the ancient Sudanese empire of Ghana. It is worth noting that, while Danquah was not the first to suggest this geno-historical link, the timing and depth of his scholarly work made it possible for the name Ghana to be assumed by the country on independence.

His nephew, William Ofori-Atta, also stayed behind in England in 1934 to read Economics at the Queen's College, Cambridge University, graduating with a BA in 1938. At Cambridge, Willie joined the influential Cambridge University Democratic Front, meetings of which were presided by the famous scientist/inventor Lord Rutherford until his death in 1937.

While Lord Rutherford was making a futile case for an international ban on the use of aeroplanes in warfare, William was speaking in prophetic opposition to British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain's appeasement policy towards Adolf Hitler of Germany. It is likely that Paa Willie developed this position of opposing appeasement through his political association with Stafford-Cripps, the notable opponent to appeasement at the time - a position which both men were soon vindicated by Hitler's expansionist militarist push for more Lebensraum (living room) for Nazi Germany across the continent of Europe.

It may be useful for Bernard Monah and his ilk to know that even before Nkrumah got to Europe, carrying a note from Dubois to George Padmore to join the Pan-Africanist movement, Paa Willie was. It does not by any stretch of the imagination compare with what Nkrumah went on to achieve for Ghana and for the anti-colonial drive in Africa. But, it is unnecessary to project Nkrumah by stepping on the corpses of others.

Anti-colonial movement
Paa Willie, whose political activities were noted by British intelligence from his days at Cambridge University around 1935-1938 to the point of being falsely seen as Communist due to his links with Creech-Jones and Stafford-Cripps, had joined the anti-colonial movement in Great Britain, which had become the breeding ground for young educated Africans in preparing them to lead the anti-colonial struggle in their respective home nations.

Paa Willie in 1937 convinced the Secretary-General and founding member of the West African Students' Union (WASU), Ladipo Solanke in pushing the agenda of the Gold Coast Farmers Union to break the cocoa cartel of Cadbury's and the UAC.

With Labour Party MPs Reginald Sorensen and Arthur Creech Jones, WASU campaigned in support of the 1938 Gold Coast cocoa hold-up, where small farmers attempted to pressurise the companies by disrupting their supplies. It was for this campaign that Paa Willie visited the factory of Cadbury and Fry in England, an experience that helped him in 1966 as Chairman of the Ghana Cocoa Marketing Board.

It may be useful at this juncture to look a little deeper into the work of WASU. It was initially formed in 1922 (but officially launched in 1925) with J B Danquah and his mate at the University College of London, the Nigerian Ladipo Solanke, and inspired by the Nigerian-born Sierra Leonean, Dr Herbert Bankole-Bright, who in 1920, with intellectual Gold Coasters, had formed the earliest regional unity group in West Africa, the National Congress of British West Africa (NCBWA). NCBWA's co-founders were, namely, Thomas Hutton-Mills, Sr., its first President, and J. E. Casely Hayford, its first Vice-President. Other co-founders and early officials included Edward Francis Small, F. V. Nanka-Bruce, A. B. Quartey-Papafio, H. van Hien, A. Sawyerr and Kobina Sekyi.

J B Danquah was WASU's ts first president and Casely Hayford was its patron. It was WASU which inspired Dr Danquah to form the Gold Coast Youth Conference in 1927 and for Nigeria's first genuine nationalist organisation, the Nigerian Youth Movement of Dr James Churchill Vaughan and Hezekiah Oladipo Davies, to be formed in the 1930s. This was when in 1930 Solanke traveled throughout West Africa, opening branches or affiliates of WASU and, with that, establishing WASU's growing identity as a leading anti-colonial group, calling in the 1930s and -40s for dominion status and universal suffrage for the West African colonies.

WASU had become the intellectual youth movement in Great Britain, which offered critical nationalist preparations for those who were to later return home to lead the anti-colonial struggle.

Ironically, Solanke, after spending some years in Africa in the 1940s lost his influence in WASU to younger and more active leaders at the time like Kwame Nkrumah who served as Vice President and later Joe Appiah, who grew in WASU to serve as its president.

British leader, Clement Attlee, had given an indication of what was achievable then when he gave a speech to WASU in which he suggested that the Atlantic Charter would apply to all nations. By 1942, while Nkrumah was in Pennsylvania, and yet to make his way to England, WASU organised a “West African Parliamentary Committee”, chaired by Labour MP, Reginald Sorensen, where it published a call for the immediate internal self-government of Britain's West African colonies, to be followed by independence within five years of the end of the war. Harold Macmillan personally visited WASU's Africa House in Camden, London, to argue the British government's case.

As stated earlier, the establishment of the Gold Coast Youth Conference by Dr Danquah in 1927 was part of a bigger project across West Africa by the leadership of WASU, which, three years later, saw Solanke touring the region, preaching and planting the organizational seeds of nationalism.

Indeed, the history of WASU offers a peak into Paa Willie's history of reconciliation. recalls the efforts by William Ofori-Atta in 1937 to resolve a dispute that threatened to break-up WASU. Solanke was accused of wasting money while in Africa, and of attempting to personally control the new lodgings, Africa House.

Independence struggle
How anyone can say Paa Willie played no role in the independence struggle shows how desperate this revisionist programme is being pushed under Mills' Ghana.

Paa Willie, for his part, in his characteristic modesty, did not claim greatness for himself. In 1979, after more than three decades in frontline politics, he said, 'My political experience derives from many years of apprenticeship to some of the great men who laid the foundation of our nation.'

In 1937, the Times newspaper of London felt it worthy enough to capture Paa Willie's role: 'The son of Sir Ofori-Atta, Knight of the British Empire and a great friend of the colonial government, says British Imperialism is a fraud.'

In those series of speeches, he shared platforms with George Padmore, Jomo Kenyatta, Arthur Creech-Jones and Sir Stafford-Cripps, whose daughter, Peggy Cripps, married a Ghanaian lawyer, politician and victim of PDA, Joe Appiah, and one time president of WASU. It was during this time that Kwame Nkrumah became Joe Appiah's close friend, to the point of Nkrumah becoming Joe Appiah's first choice for best man at his controversial socialite wedding to the British aristocrat, Peggy in 1953. Until his return to Ghana in 1954, he was the personal representative in London of the leader of the Gold Coast government, Kwame Nkrumah. But Joe Appiah was soon to be disillusioned with Nkrumah and joined the National Liberation Movement to become the MP for Atwima-Amansie in 1956. It was during his time as MP that he was twice arrested and detained, under the Preventive Detention Act, in 1961 and 1962.

Joe Appiah and Paa Willie both had aristocratic upbring, from the two royal households of Manhyia (Ashanti) and Ofori Panin Fie (Kyebi), yet their politics was noted for the welfare of the average person, steeped in social justice principles. Indeed, the development of Paa Willie's strong sense of social justice can be partly traced to his relationship with those politicians with aristocratic backgrounds who became the key movers of socialist-Marxist ideologies of the period, namely Creech Jones, George Strauss and Stafford-Cripps. Joe Appiah, of course, had a father-in-law in Sir Stafford-Cripps. In early 1939, during Paa Willie's acquaintance with Cripps, the former was expelled from the Labour Party for his advocacy of a Popular Front with the Communist Party and anti-appeasement Liberals and Conservatives. Infact, Cripps was seen then as the biggest threat to Winston Churchill's premiership, leading to him being expediently shipped out to India by the Prime Minister to negotiate with nationalist leaders Ghandi and Jinnah for a convenient arrangement that guaranteed India's loyalty to the British war effort in exchange for albeit an informal promise of full self-government after the war. Fortunately, so successful was this intervention that it helped pave the way for the series of independence from British Colonial rule that followed the end of the War.

Creech-Jones, another anti-colonialist acquaintance of Paa Willie then, was very instrumental in easing British Colonial resistance to Ghana's struggle for independence. Elected to Parliament in 1935, two years before meeting Paa Willie, he became the Secretary of the Colonial Office in the Labour government of 1945-1950. Creech Jones presided over a conference at Lancaster House for the African colonies in 1948, where the ongoing events in Ghana were instrumental in shaping the outcome. It is recalled that the Watson Commission, which contained, prominently, the views of the Big Six, had recommended in 1948, in paragraph 100 of the report, that 'the Gold Coast should become self-governing within ten years.' This report went to London to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, same Arthur Creech-Jones, who, on behalf of the British government, issued a white paper on the Watson report, with the pledge that the British government would speed up with implementing the recommendations. It led to the formation of the Coussey Constitutional Committee's appointment in December 1948, a wholly African body put together to recommend the necessary interim measures to carry out the Watson recommendations and the constitutional arrangement for self-government. Its report was ready in September 1949, three months after the formation of the CPP and four months before the declaration of 'Positive Action'.

It is this same Creech-Jones who introduced the Government Bill to give the colony of Ceylon (Burma) dominion status and eventual independence. He thus presided over the Colonial Office's first granting of independence to a 'non-white' colony, which was followed a year later by Independence for India and Pakistan.

Is Paa Willie's role being diminished today because he was not in Ghana at the material time of independence declaration in March 1957? For the period 1955-59 Paa Willie returned to England to study law, emerging from Gray's Inn as a Barrister-at-Law. Surely, that would be preposterous.

K A Gbedemah says of Paa Willie:
'As a result of the Watson Commission, the Coussey Constitution replaced the Burns Constitution, and, under it, William gained a seat in the National Assembly in 1951. For the three and half years of this Parliament, William was one of the assiduous members, debating toughly with humour, wit and pungency, but without acrimony. He, however, lost his seat in the 1954 Parliamentary Elections, but most members of the house labeled him the Non-Elected Parliamentary member because of his continued interest and concern for national affair. He was often there in the galleries. It was during this period that from 1961-1965 that he suffered his 2nd and 3rd detentions under the First Republic.'

R R Amponsah says more of Paa Willie:
'In the United Gold Coast Convention, the Ghana Congress Party, the United Party, the Progress Party and lately the United National Convention, he always strove to foster understanding, not only within his own political party but also between his party and the opposing parties.'

He continues:
'The irony of the politics of Ghana was that he was himself detained in prison five times by two independent Ghana governments. And while the British Colonial administration kept him and his colleagues in government bungalow at their place of detention, the two Ghana governments of his own kith and kin detained him in prison with criminals. Yet, throughout his political life, he never showed any sign of vengeance, malice or bitterness against those responsible.'

All of this revisionist obliteration is to cement a political dualism that denigrates the NPP as enemies of progress, with the hope of getting the NDC to annex the CPP.

This is part of a piece by the Executive Director of the Danquah Institute.