Commenting on my recent article “Denkyira-Obuasi to Ahafo-Hwediem”, Ghana’s former Deputy African Union (AU) Chairman,Kwesi Quartey, quipped humorously, saying, “Situation, no change!”
This was his extract from my opening paragraph, which stated: “At a funeral reception recently, a colleague asked why I sometimes refer to articles I wrote some years back!
My simple answer was, ‘Abed (Abednego), it is because, as we say in the military, situation, no change, when things remain unchanged.
So, while one would want to write about positive and more interesting topics on national development, “galamsey”, corruption, insults/unbridled arrogance, filth, bad roads, schools-under-trees, etc., still dominate news!”
Insult consultants?
This time, on TV in the full glare of all, two senior academics, a professor and a senior lecturer, traded insults, which got close to fisticuffs.
As I watched the unbelievable spectacle and related it to cases of indiscipline in senior high school (SHS), I remembered Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, in which he asked the famous question: “If gold rusts, what will iron do?”
What are the lecturers in this duel teaching their students?
It also reminded me of my February 28, 2018, article titled: “Values, Attitudes and Law Enforcement”, a portion of which i narrate below. Unkempt kids
Recently, a young single parent recounted her experience when she took her child to school on a Monday morning.
As can be expected of an elite Ghanaian basic school, an assortment of luxurious cars trooped in each morning to bring the children of their rich owners to school.
However, what struck Jay that Monday morning about the routine dropping off of children was that the children who came out of those posh cars looked more like coal miners at the end of their shift.
While their school uniforms looked dirty and scruffy, their general appearance, particularly their unkempt hair, was disturbing to Jay, a single parent.
What upbringing were such rich parents, who dropped off their kids in luxurious vehicles, giving their children, seeing nothing wrong with bringing them to school so dirty on a Monday morning?
This incident brought back a question my nephew asked his mother a few years ago, which was referred to me! The young university graduate asked his mother what legacy their parents were leaving for them.
He fired at his mother that she and her siblings constantly spoke fondly and lovingly about the virtues and discipline their parents instilled in them.
Then he continued saying: “All we hear you do daily is hurl insults at one another using intemperate language and showing open disrespect to one another in the full glare of the whole world.
Meanwhile, ours is a country which produces nothing apart from bitters and building filling stations.
We import everything, including toothpicks and vegetables, from neighbouring and faraway countries.
Corruption has deep roots and is strangling us with the power of a chokehold.
Are you our parents, happy bequeathing us with a legacy of violence, indiscipline, stealing, lies, filth and corruption, and consigning us to permanent poverty with the huge debts you are leaving for us after all your conspicuous consumption?”
The mother was sad about her son’s questions as she realised that she had no answers to them. She asked me: “Uncle Dan, so what do we do?”
President Sukarno
On a visit to Indonesia in 1968, Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore was impressed with what he saw.
He, therefore, complimented President Sukarno of Indonesia with these words: “You are blessed with a beautiful country”.
Sukharno’s answer was “Yes, God has blessed us.
The problem is the people”.
Like Lee, I think Ghana is blessed. But, how about its people, as Sukarno said about Indonesians?
Certainly, the people of Ghana need visionary and good leadership by example/integrity to ensure a change in values and attitudes.
Most importantly, we have to enforce our laws! Time without number, I have heard on the radio/TV experts chorus that Ghana has some of the best laws in the world.
