Why Ghanaian Civil And Public Servants Must Take Much Of The Blame For The Sorry State Of Ghana After 59 Years

“O judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts, and men have lost their reason!" (William Shakespeare, in Julius Caesar)

As happens to me most weeks, I have already received four very interesting video clips through the social media this week; three of them quite distressing, the fourth of which provides a ray of light for the future of Africa.

The three gloomy clips come from Ghana: the first on the devastation that illegal Chinese miners have been causing to the environment of large swathes of arable farmlands, and even mature cocoa farms in the countryside. The second clip is on the fact that the President of the Republic of Ghana has caused to be built on the pristine grounds of Flagstaff (or Jubilee House, depending on your perspective), a warehouse or stonehouse, without the permission of the people of Ghana. The third clip concerns the error ridden official 59^th Independence Anniversary celebration brochure that the people of Ghana probably paid through their noses in bribes, over invoicing and under invoicing for.

The clip with good news concerns a huge gas discovery in Tanzania, whose announcement public and civil servants decided rightly to withhold until after crucial national elections in that country.

At least eighty percent of the blame for the current sorry state of Ghana can be laid squarely at the feet of spineless and timid civil and public servants, who do not seem to be able to differentiate what is right for the nation and what is expedient for the thieving political class. Much of the problems that bedevil the country today could have been avoided if our civil service, in particular, had been as professional as the service was originally established to be. Instead the civil service that was touted to be one of the best in Africa and the developing world in general at Independence, today cannot even supervise an important document like a national celebration brochure that foreign dignitaries have taken to their countries. I will not be surprised if many of them threw theirs into the waste baskets in their hotel rooms before they booked out of them!

What happened to the Ghana civil service that produced administrative gems like A L Adu, Robert Gardiner, K K Dadzie, K A Ghartey and others of years gone by? These were men who served the global civil service with distinction for years. Are we so bereft of reading material that we cannot learn and follow the golden paths that were beaten by these illustrious compatriots?

Ironically, some of the worst culprits who pandered to the “we no go sit down make them cheat we” brigade that began the rot, were men and women who cut their teeth on the exploits of these distinguished civil and public servants of the immediate pre- and post-independence eras. For a pot of the crumbs under the table of “buga buga” soldiers, they sold their consciences and allowed unthinking so-called revolutionaries, who turned out to be the worst rogues in the annals of the rulership of Ghana, to destroy the finest of the nation’s institutions.

At election time trained engineers allow themselves to be paraded on television lying through their teeth about the construction of non-existent roads and highways or badly constructed ones that would be washed away in the next rainy season.

The Presidential residence
Directly or indirectly, the presidency of Ghana has admitted that an unplanned construction has taken place at the residence of the President of the Republic of Ghana. I do not care what they call it or what the purpose for that construction is. The mere fact that it has been done, probably at an inflated price, with the people’s money, without their consent makes it illegal, despicable and environmentally detestable!

In nearly every one of the so-called upmarket residential areas of Ghana, and particularly Accra and Kumasi, one finds unauthorised structures, many of them very badly constructed eyesores and often dangerous to the occupants of the main buildings. Even in army and police barracks, there are hencoops and other unsightly additions to official structures. And the reason these structures exist and continue to spring up all over the place is because the people that are paid by the taxpayer to enforce proper building regulations either couldn’t care less or else take pitiful bribes and look the other way while they are built.

If the President wants to bring the escaped guinea fowls back to Ghana, he can do so but not at the expense of this national monument. Yes, he and his late boss initially called it a hencoop, but he now lives there and therefore cannot continue to make it a hencoop!

The “galamsey” devastation
Driving through what used to be prime farmlands in the Western and Central Regions during my recent visit to Ghana, I could not stop myself shedding a tear for some of the most beautiful sites and memories of my childhood in the two regions. I could not make it to Kyebi where I spent part of my formative years, but my relations who still live there tell me that the story is the same.

I read about Krobo Edusie’s “we can do anything except change a man into a woman and vice versa” as a child (poor Moke, he didn’t live long to see it done routinely these days), but possibly the daftest election promise any politician ever made in Ghana has been Ata Mills’ “I will legalise galamsey, if you vote for me” offer. El Nino may have brought extreme weather conditions to parts of the country, but the drying and pollution of major rivers and streams in many parts of the Central, Western, Ashanti and Eastern Regions have their origins in that policy and Ghanaian politicians and their civil servant poodles who helped them bring in the poverty stricken Chinese to destroy our lands and colonise large tracts of our country must never be allowed to forget that crime against generations of Ghanaians unborn.

Ghana has been importing plantain, grasscutters, and crabs from Cote d’Ivoire and carrots and other vegetables from Togo and beyond, for years. Apparently we are now importing cocoa beans from Cote d’Ivoire as well. With the Chinese invasion and the impunity with which they are destroying our water bodies, it will not be long before we start importing water from Cote d’Ivore and other places. Is this the independence we have just spent heavily to celebrate, botching even that big time in the process?

Good news from Tanzania
Because of the perennially depressing news from every corner of the African continent, I seem to always end my pieces with bad news. For today, however, there is good news. Public and civil servants in Tanzania decided late last year, to defy pressures from the politicians to delay the announcement of a huge discovery of gas on land, so as not to give undue advantage to one group of politicians or other. The technocrats decided that the good news belonged to the people of Tanzania, and not even a morale boosting joy at Christmas was worth getting pompous politicians to behave as if their pee formed the gas in the ground 175 million years ago. They supressed the news until after the elections! Well done, guys.

Are the bosses of GNPC, the Electoral Commission, The Statistical Service of Ghana, the Ghana Health Service, Ghana Education Service and Chamber of Mines listening? You do not owe anything to these selfish politicians. They will only use you and dump you like rags. When you retire, you will need Korle Bu and Gee to help manage your health in your twilight years. You better make sure that the health institutions in the country are well resourced. The crooks will abandon you to your own fate, while they fly to South Africa and elsewhere to treat their piles!

Would you really like your grandchildren to learn one day that you were part of the men and women who sold their consciences for rat-infested government bungalows?

I shall return with my beaded gourd, God willing.
Naana Ekua Eyaaba has an overarching interest in the development of the African continent and Black issues in general. Having travelled extensively through Africa, the Black communities of the East Coast of the United States as well as London and Leeds (United Kingdom), she enjoys reading, and writes when she is irritated, and edits when she is calm. You can email her at [email protected] , or read her blog at https://naanaekuaeyaaba.wordpress.com/.