Zimbabwe through the eyes of Ghana

On December 31, 1981, when Fte./Lte. Jerry John Rawlings seized power in a military coup in Ghana, it was the second time he had burst onto the political scene; the first was in June 1979. Back then, he cleaned up, held democratic elections in which he did not participate, and then returned to the military barracks after a mere three months in office. He was tumultuously hailed as a national hero. An adulating public nicknamed him "J.J.-Junior Jesus." But when he returned again in 1981, I was not so sure of his "sainthood." An avowed Marxist revolutionary, Rawlings proceeded to establish the most brutal, the most cruel, the most barbarous, and the most economically ruinous administration in Ghana's history. Even though my own sister, Sherry, was part of his government, I fought that military junta relentlessly, tooth and nail-on principle. Though Rawlings's Provisional National Defense Council (PNDC) bore the hallmarks of a brutal military junta, it earned a unique distinction by the depths of depravity and barbarity into which it sank. Amnesty International estimated that, between 1981 and 1992, over 200 Ghanaians "disappeared." The regime was infamous for "shit bombing"-dumping human excreta in the offices of newspaper critical of Rawlings's policies.
 
After the collapse of the former Soviet Union in 1991, the Rawlings regime came under intense pressure from both internal and external sources to reform its abominable political system. He put in place a coconut commission to write a constitution that was to his liking, and he transformed his PNDC into the National Democratic Congress (NDC)-removing the "P" from PNDC. The constitution limited the tenure of the president to two terms, but Rawlings insisted that all those years he had served as president-from 1981 to 1992-did not count because Ghana had not had a constitution then. So he stood for election in 1992 and "won."
 
We vowed to remove that canker from the Ghanaian political scene. We drew inspiration from the revolutions in Eastern Europe and the winds of change that swept across Africa in the early 1990s, toppling despots in Benin, Cape Verde Islands, and Zambia, among others. The key moment came on December 4, 1994, when police raided the premises of Dr. Charles Wereko-Brobbey and seized the transmission equipment of Radio Eye. The operators of the "illegal" or pirate radio station, Dr. Wereko-Brobbey and Victor Newmann, decided to present a petition to parliament. They were joined by supporters numbering about 1,000, but the marchers were attacked by government-hired thugs. We cobbled together a team of high-powered lawyers to argue that the closure of Radio Eye was "unconstitutional," and we eventually won in court. That "forced the government to issue many FM frequencies for other private stations, creating a new era of 'broadcast pluralism." It opened the airwaves and paved the way for a proliferation of FM radio stations, which helped toss the regime out of power in the 2000 elections. Note: The broadcasting format the new FM stations adopted was call-in shows, which allowed the people to vent their anger and frustrations. Security officials could not arrest the callers or the hosts of the programs. During this same period, we also waged a ferocious campaign for a free print media. Despite being shit-bombed, the newspapers in Ghana fought gallantly and flourished.
 
The regime's Achilles heel, however, was the economy. Despite the billions poured into Ghana, economic performance was lackluster. Government expenditures were spiraling out of control owing to the excess spending on security. Hungry for revenue, the regime began taxing anything that moved, imposing user fees on public latrines, hospital visits, and even clean water. The last straw was a value-added tax (VAT) the regime was contemplating imposing in March 1995.
 
In privately owned newspapers across Ghana, I attacked VAT as a "vampire tax." "Ghanaians are over-taxed," I railed. A group of us, including Dr. Wereko-Brobbey and Victor Newmann, the operators of Radio Eye, mobilized the people to protest the impending tax. The regime was caught off guard and rescinded its decision to introduce VAT-chalk up one victory for the opposition. Emboldened, we organized protest rallies to express our disgust at the regime and demand freedom of expression and political reform.
 
The first such peaceful demonstration in the streets of Accra, the capital, brought out over 80,000 people on May 12, 1995, and was dubbed "Kume Preko" (You might as well kill me). Indeed, government-hired thugs opened fire on demonstrators, killing four of them. But pro-democracy activists were not deterred. We organized another demonstration at Kumasi, calling it "Sieme Preko" (You might as well bury me). Subsequent street protests followed in other cities; I spoke at a number of them. The momentum was building to a fever pitch. Elections were scheduled for the following year, 1996. Giddy over the success of the Kume Preko demonstrations, we vowed to toss out Rawlings's barbarous military-cum-civilian regime.
 
We set up a group called Alliance for Change (AFC), composed of 10 individuals. I set up a correspondent group in the United States called the Committee of Concerned Citizens of Ghana (CCCG) to coordinate with AFC. I set up another group, Ghana Cyberspace Group (GCF) with one Yaw Owusu to mobilize young Ghanaian professionals. Unfortunately, we lost the 1996 elections; the reason had less to do with the evil Rawlings regime than with our own ineffectual strategies and blunders-for example, incessant bickering among the opposition parties.