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DEMOCRATIC SYSTEM – A Proposal for A More
Inclusive and Functional Model
Alex Aidoo-Micah and Kwaku A. Danso
www.globalexpressonline.com
Part 1
Half a century after political
independence, the development of Ghana, even though
praised by some outsiders in comparison to other
African nations, has seen five revolutions and four
constitutions. Ghana’s economic development is still
far behind nations like Singapore which had a
similar experience as Ghana under British colonial
rule. Despite Ghana’s apparent economic turn-around
in the last decades or so, there seems to be
elements of instability that make an economic
miracle almost impossible when carefully analyzed.
The core distinction between the progress of Ghana
and that of Singapore may lie in how Ghana’s
partisan political system has been intertwined with
a culture that relies heavily on tribal preferences.
This has made the new democratic leadership unable
to grapple with and manage the complicated existing
system under the rule of law, with inherent
influences of tribal chiefs in all towns, districts
and sub-regions who wield no administrative duties
and responsibilities. A proposal is hereby outlined
(in Part 2) that offers the best merger of a
democratic system under rule of central and local
laws, administered and managed with a modification
of indigenous and traditional governance systems,
but with self empowered towns and district councils
who will advertise and hire competent professional
staff to design their budgets and accounting
systems. In part one we give the argument for
change.
Part 1 - Reasons to be Proud and
Reason to Ponder into the Future
Ghana has made some progress over the
past 18 years of democratic rule, something which
was not enjoyed by the founding fathers of Ghana’s
democracy half a century ago. However the relative
stability is evaluated in view of the previous three
decades of instability caused mostly by a
misunderstood system filled with partisan and tribal
dislocations to discipline in the application of the
rule of law for optimal socio-economic progress. In
Part 1, we will review this progress, and show its
correlation with political stability.
Achievements
With many African and other nations
going through a turmoil, the International
Community, particularly the Western world, sees
Ghana as an African success story with respect to
party political democratic stability. Over the past
18 years we have successfully held five presidential
elections and twice changed governments. This is by
no means a small achievement by African standards.
We only need to look across our western border to
see the current post-election political turmoil in
next-door Ivory Coast to fully appreciate the
magnitude of our achievement in this regard and also
to legitimise any sense of national pride we can
humbly lay claim to as a people.
However, is this enough? The real
benefits in political stability are indicated by
economic growth, improvement in human development,
standard of living of the average Ghanaian, and a
decline in the level of corruption among others. In
other words, political stability should result in
real growth in GDP, a measure of economic growth and
improvement in living standards, and must result in
a country progressively climbing up on the
Corruption Perception Index (CPI) which measures
both domestic and public sector corruption. The
burden on the average person for daily living should
be declining.
This correlation is better captured
in the following statement by Huguette Labelle,
Chair of Transparency International (TI): ....
"(S)ignificantly
greater efforts must go into strengthening
governance across the globe. With the livelihoods of
so many at stake, governments' commitments to
anti-corruption, transparency and accountability
must speak through their actions. Good governance is
an essential part of the solution to the global
policy challenges governments face today."
( Labelle, H., Transparency International, 2010).
Indeed, Ghana’s short political
stability has already been hailed by credible
international institutions as having indicated these
benefits. Since the birth of the fourth republic in
1992, the country has overcome the initial teething
economic turbulence that characterised the early
years of the fourth republic and has since recorded
a steady growth in its GDP, averaging 6-7% since
2006. Poverty levels, as defined by the UN, fell
from 52% in 1992 to 29% in 2006 and the country is
on track to achieving the Millennium Development
Goal of halving poverty by 2015 according to an
August 2009 IDA report. The following Index Mundi
graph captures our stability-induced performance
more vividly:
A recent U.S. Department of State
Background Note on Ghana also had the following
enviable outlook on Ghana:
Political stability, overall sound
economic management, a low crime rate, competitive
wages, and an educated, English-speaking workforce
have increased Ghana's potential to serve as a West
African hub for American businesses (U.S. Department
of State, Background Note: Ghana, Sept. 17, 2010).
The World Bank is even more
optimistic about Ghana’s growth outlook projecting
that Ghana will be the fastest growing economy in
Sub-Saharan Africa, with growth rate of 13.4 per
cent in 2011, dropping to 10 per cent in 2012.
Additionally, Ghana’s Corruption
Perception Index has shown some improvement,
although it is marginal. Starting at 3.9 in 2002, it
dipped to a minimum of 3.3 before rising to 4.1 in
2010 and earning Ghana a ranking of 62nd on
Worldwide Corruption Perceptions league of countries
published by Transparency International. The report
also identifies that ‘’unstable governments, often
with a legacy of conflict, continue to dominate the
bottom rungs of the CPI. Afghanistan and Myanmar
share second to last place with a score of 1.4, with
Somalia coming in last with a score of 1.1.’’
Thus, the evidence supports a strong
correlation between political stability and good
democratic governance on one hand and economic
wellbeing and decline in corruption on the other.
Ghana’s young political stability has reflected
these trends quite well. However, those African
countries with relatively greater political
stability such as Botswana and Uganda posit even
more enviable trends in relative terms.
Time-Bomb of Dissatisfaction
It is quite apparent, however, that
there is real concern among Ghanaians about the
sustainability of our political stability. Is our
politics really stable or is it simply building up
to an imminent explosion or implosion? Prof. George
Ayittey of The American University in Washington DC
often points out such social time bombs among
African nations. There is no question the five
democratic elections we have had in the fourth
republic (since 1992) have been characterised by a
progressively escalating sense of unease and real
violence which are fast coming to a flash point. A
recent outburst of an elected Presidential candidate
of one of the two major political parties in Ghana,
that in the next elections, “all-die-be-die” is a
street-language communication of the situation, that
people are at their limit of frustration and
desperation and of a possible implosion if changes
are not seen in society. If we are to be honest with
ourselves, we should not hesitate to concede that
party political system has come to deepen intrinsic
divisions among our people; divisions that derive
from our ethnic multiplicity – we have about 92
separate ethnic groups, and every major achievement
or mistake, even criminal charges of our people in
leadership seem to be interpreted on ethnic or
political basis.
Income and Wealth Gap
In addition to ethnicity-related
tensions caused by perceptions of social injustice,
biases or inequalities in appointments to government
jobs and top level positions, depending on who is in
power, there is a growing income and wealth gap
between the poor and the rich. While government
employees at management and executive levels obtain
benefits including vehicles, houses, free petrol and
cash allowances to buy furniture, water reservoirs
and huge electric power generators, the
infrastructural development in Ghana has also been
allowed to fall behind human population growth.
Basic human needs and utilities such as water and
electricity are being rationed, while general
infrastructure development is not keeping pace with
increased demand. Research work on leadership
perceptions and expectations conducted between 2004
and 2006 within the business community in the Accra-Tema
metropolitan area showed more than 70%
dissatisfaction rate in the delivery of water,
electricity and telecommunication systems (Danso, K.
A., 2007). Most of the respondents, including
self-employed skilled craftsmen and artisans
(carpenters, electricians, masons and plumbers)
indicated the poor delivery of these services had a
negative impact on their businesses.
Facilities and Resource
Distribution
It does not take much analysis to
note that in a society where the skilled workers
cannot attain middle class status and spend hours
each day in traffic, productivity goes down, income
levels get stymied, and frustration breeds. The
frustration of the average Ghanaian does not seem to
be shared by successive governments whose executive
are seen to be leading overly comfortable and
affluent lifestyles subsidized from state coffers,
including insulation from energy price inflation.
Trying to survive and compete for small businesses
is very difficult. According to the management of
Ghana Water Company which has since 2005 been in the
hands of a foreign Management company, Aqua Vitens
Rand Ltd., there has been no major expansion of the
water treatment facilities in Ghana since the first
government in 1965. The research also showed that
electric power transformers in major residential
areas are have not been upgraded for over a decade
despite alleged World Bank loan infusions for the
purpose.
Roads and Traffic
Another source of frustration within
communities is traffic delays and commute time,
which seems to take an increasing percentage of
total working hours. A typical commuter in Accra
takes about 4 hours per day round trip to work 8
hours. Road construction and expansion works are
simply not meeting increased traffic growth over the
years. Typical excessive delays and uncompleted or
abandoned road construction works produce excessive
frustration in society that further exacerbate
tensions as politicians are seen to be of no value
to the citizenry.
Business Capital
Another major frustration in Ghana
that keeps the poor poorer is the lack of business
capital, either from the Banks or private sector. It
is general knowledge that in Ghana if you don’t know
“somebody” in the system, it is no use applying for
a loan. Such opportunities are usually tied to
ethnic preferences or partisan political
connections. Foreign grants such as the US
Millennium Challenge Awards, MCA, are awarded
through government, and are generally perceived to
be naturally disbursed through the same preferential
tribal and political connections. These issues help
widen the gap between the elite who get into
government service and their few friends, and the
ordinary self-employed worker.
Schools and Health facilities
One major factor for long-term
consideration is the deterioration of public schools
and health care facilities. The economic gap created
by these unjust social disparities and aberrations
in opportunities further affects the educational
future and opportunities for the average person.
Admission to, and quality of health care provided at
the government-owned facilities also seem to have an
economic and class differentiation. A National
Health Insurance Levy (NHIL) collected for about a
decade on all imported and sold items has not made a
difference in heath delivery quality and the number
of health facilities or health care equipment around
the nation. Government executives, on the other
hand, have been known to be flown overseas for
medical treatment. With the exception of private
clinics and University Hospitals introduced in Ghana
for those who can afford their much more expensive
services, government hospitals have been providing
paid medical services including all major surgeries
and treatment to the bulk of the population since
the first Republic in the 1960s. However, class
distinction has been carried to the point where
health and life itself, as well as education for
children, have become indexed with ones political or
economic status. In a nation where an estimated 80%
or more live under $2 per day, such disparities lead
to instability.
There is no doubt then that these
disparities and preferential treatment of the people
due to centralized power, neglect of towns and
districts with no elected and concerned leaders, and
the preferential treatment due to partisan and
tribal connections, have further exacerbated the
political divide among our people and it is not hard
to see Ghana may be working on a time bomb.
A Deep-Seated Problem
The polarisation of our country by
party politics is not a recent and transient
phenomenon. Our immediate post-independence politics
could not resist the allure of ethnicity in offering
an enclave of subjectivity, false sense of security
and the support it offered key players. Instead of
developing objective and sustainable political and
development agenda and seeking national appeals for
them, they developed parties around key individuals
with specific ethnic appeals and self-centered
schemes that led to massive misappropriation of
foreign grants, capital flight, abuse of power,
graft and other forms of corruption. Worst of all,
it made law enforcement and fiscal discipline very
difficult as chiefs and elders travelled from the
villages to pay tribute or homage to the elected
President and seek favours.
The resultant polarisation of our
young country and the subsequent ethnic and
sectarian violence that became reminiscent of our
politics are the seeds which have blossomed in our
politics today. Politicians continue to use overt
and covert means to exploit tribal Chiefs’ pivotal
influence in accessing tribal support leading to
suppression of genuine democratic developments at
the grassroots. Where this form of partisan politics
has combined with tribal power struggles, in an
atmosphere of mass poverty, it has led on a few
occasions to the very violent intra-tribal clashes.
There has even been a case or two where some tribal
Chiefs and members of their household or advisers
have been massacred, the latest being the Dagbon Ya-Na
murders of 2003 that has not been resolved for eight
years.
The irony of these is that the first
President of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah, was from an
ethnic minority, the Nzema, which has even a
language differential between its next closest
cousins the Fantes. Under his leadership an attempt
was made to divide the nation into regions and
districts with no mention of tribe. Despite a half
century of democratic practice, the statement by one
chief in the Western Region summarizes the thought
patterns of many Ghanaians
in their voting patterns. In a Press Conference held
on Saturday, 16th April, 2012 at Biriwa in the
Mfantseman West Constituency of the Central Region,
the paramount Chief, Nana Akyin Attanya V advised
the members to rally around Nana Konadu to help
build a prosperous nation. Among the reasons given
to support Nana Konadu was this statement that she
is competent and a courageous and dynamic woman, and
then added that it was not surprising of her
competency and that he believes “it's because Nana
Konadu was born in the Central Region and Cape Coast
to be precise” (Myjoyfmonline, 2011 Apr. 18)
Party politics has not enjoyed a
history of sustainability in our country and in
those parts of Africa where there is multiplicity of
indigenous ethnicity. It has been a cycle of
transient but apparent stability to the outside
world, corruption and abuse of foreign grants and
loans, followed by costly and often violent
disintegration of the political and social systems,
leading to equal disintegration of economic
structures and gains, as well as disruptions in any
domestic or foreign investments.
Lesson from Others
This distinctive polarising nature of
party politics is not an African exclusivity. The
United Kingdom, one of the forebears of modern party
democratic politics with over 300 years of
democratic governance, has only four indigenous
ethnic groupings; It is a union of four distinct
countries – the English, Welsh, Scots and Irish (of
Northern Ireland) – but even with a number as small
as four ethnicities, it has struggled and stuttered
along its political journey because party politics
is inherently divisive. Britain has had to modify
its political structures to ease ethnic and class
tensions. In as recent as 1997, Britain had to
devolve power away from Westminster and to set up
the Scottish, Welsh and Irish parliaments. Professor
Eric Evans in an article, A British Revolution in
the 19th Century, dated 17/02/2011, acknowledges
that Britain’s ability to avoid fundamental conflict
between classes and social groups is due to the
country’s ability to manage evolutionary rather than
revolutionary political change.
The lesson here is that although,
democratic principles are absolute and universal,
the political systems and processes by which they
are achieved are not, and must be fashioned out
based on a people’s history and cultural and ethnic
diversity as well as its general demographic
patterns. The wholesale importation of a political
system of one country by another can have only one
consequence – ultimate failure and disaster if not
properly applied and adapted. It is only right for
our leaders, mostly educated in the West, to meet
and do serious debate, analysis and thinking, and
copy the best aspects of the West, adapt them
pragmatically to their society, just as Lee Kuan Yew
of Singapore did to catapult his nation form a third
world nation at a GDP per capita of around $400 to
over $23,000 in 35 years. There is no reason why
Ghana with a higher number of educated people
scattered all around the world with valuable
experience from all corners of the globe, cannot
pull ourselves out of poverty if we can stop a few
greedy and selfish people who seem to thwart this
process with a more robust, transparent system of
government.
In view of this, unless our political
system is subjected to a continuous process of
evolutionary review, it is bound to attract a cycle
of revolutionary interruptions as evidenced by the
many revolutions or coup d’etats in the
post-independence era in Ghana’s recent memory. For
all intents and purposes, we as a nation are
desperately struggling to hold together our
fragmented political system. However, we need to
make an objective analysis of our situation and act
quickly to prevent it reaching a crisis point.
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