Many a Ghanaian is Suffering from "Ghana dee saa" Syndrome

dead goat syndrome

“Ghana dee saa” is an infectious, if not a chronic epidemical syndrome affecting almost all Ghanaians to render us completely ineffective and weak to solving our teeming socio-politico-economic problems. As our former President John Dramani Mahama self-proclaimed to suffer from the “dead goat” syndrome; purporting he is unfeeling to any insults hurled at him hence would not listen to any Ghanaian but would do what he wanted no matter how callous his actions were to Ghanaians, so are most Ghanaians nonchalant about the enforcement of the laws of the land hence giving rise to the “Ghana dee saa” epidemic.

No matter how good your intentions are, I have been made to understand by many a Ghanaian that once you go to Ghana and being a Ghanaian, you will catch that humiliating syndrome of “Ghana dee saa”.

What is this phrasal “Ghana dee saa”, one may ask? It is simply a situation in Ghana where everyone thinks, or has come to accept that in Ghana, laws are not to be respected but to yield in to the demands of the corrupt practices by the elite. When a police personnel is openly taking bribes from motorists on the roads; when a judge is accepting bribes to twist justice in favour of the highest bidder who although should have been pronounced guilty; when a government appointee or a highly-placed Civil Servant is taking a 5% kickback before awarding a contract to you, when unqualified persons are paying bribes to the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) to be issued with driving license; when chiefs are becoming autocrats, although we are in a republic, etc., most Ghanaians have come to accept all these illegal practices as part of the Ghanaian way of life. When a so-called powerful King in Ghana uses the security personnel to intimidate and oppress innocent persons when he is clearly in the wrong, stealing from innocent but poor and needy persons, some Ghanaians have come to accept that as his right and the way forward to living in opulence by virtue of his position.

The “Ghana dee saa” bodes on absolute negativities hence my country Ghana stagnating, if not retrogressing, when compared to the acceleration of human resource and economic development of the Western civilized world where laws are respected and enforced to the hilt. The respect of the law with its stringent enforcement is the cardinal pivot on which every successful economy and the powerful nations in the world revolve. Subsequently, the “Ghana dee saa” syndrome or disease is in effect pulling us backwards instead of having structures in place to catapult us forward into the orbit of economic prosperity for all and the respect of the law.

Unless we have farsighted leaders with intellect to strengthen our institutions as once advised by the former President of America, Mr Barack Obama, when he visited Ghana, Ghana and the people therein will continually wallow in ignorance and in the dangers of our black mentality where we resign ourselves to fate only to have a few bullies and criminals toy with our lives and the country to the detriment of the majority of the citizens.

Yes, all Ghanaians must check and discard their negative black mentality before Ghana can move forward. However, if the degree of the rot is so much so that we cannot change voluntarily, then it should take a strong government and leadership, be whatever it is, to oblige us to shed our unhelpfully disastrous negative-laden Ghanaian mentality.

We should not accept negative attitudes, corruption and suppression under the hands of a few well-positioned persons as the way forward to building Ghana. My experience gained as a result of residing among the Whites does tell me that Ghanaians will forever remain underdogs to the Whites should we continually revere dwelling in our lackadaisical Ghanaian-mindedness of “Ghana dee saa” way of going about our daily lives.

I really expected His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to stamp his authority to rid Ghana of certain negative attitudes but the way things are going, I risk being left disappointed. The propensity by the police to take bribes goes on unabated. Some of our court judges, court registrars and clerks as well as some employees within the Civil Service are still carrying on with their inhered corrupt practices as if no change in government has taken place.

In the bible, whether it is true or false, it is said that God simply had to command by word of mouth saying, let there be this or that and instantly they were. Similarly, although in a much lesser form, the 1992 Ghana Republican Constitution, although as not much desirable as it should have been, has bestowed on the President some Executive powers to have his meaningful way in certain things. Why can’t the President use them for the benefit of Ghanaians but be dithering while some crimes get propped and ramified? Is the “Ghana dee saa” more powerful than the President and his government or they have been infected by that syndrome or disease? I love to know.

No foreign government or foreign individual can build Ghana into a prosperous nation admirable to all than Ghanaians themselves can do. Therefore, His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the Lord’s anointed present day Joseph, Moses or David, must please reflect on his calling by God to do exactly that. God and Ghanaians wanted you to come to liberate the Ghanaian citizenry from the devastating and humiliating poverty and oppression under the hands of the few highly-placed persons and the destruction of the country through illegal surface mining (galamsey); all such ills sanctioned by the former President John Dramani Mahama’s NDC-led government.

Fellow Ghanaians, please, let us all try to be one another’s keeper. Let us shed our negative attitudes and assist the government led by His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to succeed to bring smiles back to our faces.

I hear that the sufferer of the “dead goat” syndrome has declared his intentions to come back to contest the 2020 general elections in the hope of winning it to bring back the devastating galamsey, cancel the teachers and nurses’ allowance, collapse the now reviving NHIS and finally, abrogate the free Senior High School education policy as well as going back to reintroduce his favourite “create, loot and share” policies. What a gluttonous person he is! However, the choice is for Ghanaians to make.

I detest hearing “Ghana dee saa” because it denigrates us as a people and a nation.

Rockson Adofo