NO GLORY IN SLAUGHTER…

I have followed closely events of the past few days especially the reaction of most young people to the social media campaign calling on the political authorities to ‘fix the country’. I must say I share largely in the sentiments expressed by these activists.

However, something which have been plaguing me about the sustainability of the democracy of this fourth republic seems to be gaining traction in light of the social media activism I referred to earlier. This is something that must worry the political leaders of this country and anyone interested in protecting the democracy of this country.

I believe democracy is the best path for development of this country. I believe democracy has led to substantial improvement in various aspects of our national life. But that knowledge of the history of our democratic dividend is lost on most young people and I don’t blame them for it.

The slow pace of political reforms, economic prosperity, rampant corruption and increasing inequality means we can no longer rely on the settled and embedded political settlement of this fourth republic to appease young people. The rapidity of technology and sorely lack of knowledge of history means it has become quite easy to tap into the anxiety of young people for destructive purposes.

Few would disagree that Ghana’s political class is chronically corrupt and ignores the plight of a vast majority of Ghanaians, preferring to ride on a network of patronage and clientelism. But the approach of a new crop of social media commentators stripping every problem confronting the nation of its nuance, replacing reasoned diagnosis of developmental challenges with debasing insults to ‘leaders’, intellectual analysis by raw emotion is also not sustainable.

The way it was easy to distinguish democracy from authoritarianism for our parents’ generation is no longer available today. The unemployed young men who are increasingly lining up the streets of our urban centres with few prospects mired in seething anger will not find it any important to defend the democracy of our times. It explains the reason for the sharp turn to populism by most of our youths.

I must say I don’t doubt the intentions of these commentators, but I fear the ramifications of their populism and it is for this reason I call on the political establishment to as a matter of urgency respond in an appropriate manner to the agitations of these activists and most young people in Ghana.

The press tends to ride on the politics of the negative in times of crisis and these times are no different. The rapidity of technology has radically shifted the media landscape which makes it easier to spread disinformation. Young people in Ghana like elsewhere no longer rely on conventional outlet for news. They pick most of their information from elsewhere and only a change in their lived experience can assuage their desire for a revolutionary change.

In a conversation with a friend of mine from university who lives outside the country now, he pointed out the viewing numbers of certain commentators on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube to me. This trend was something I had been observing for a while now. Increasingly, most of our desperate young people are turning to these populist commentators. These commentators are employing the inefficiency and inertia of the political establishment as a tool to draw people to their populism. This is a common trend for the descent toward radical populism.

Most young people are fed up with politics of old, they no longer believe in politics as usual. The anger of such young people is unrelentless and prone to exploitation by populist figures. The political leadership can no longer stay out of touch with the struggles of ordinary Ghanaians trying to survive daily.

Young people have had enough and if we don’t demonstrate that democracy can deliver prosperity, I am afraid we are going to lose out once more to the populists despite the weight of history. It is easy to give voice to people’s frustrations and that is what populists are good at. Selling deceptively simple answers to complex problems appeal to young people frustrated at constricting economic opportunities.

But offering real answers and solutions to the frustrations is a hard task and that is the responsibility of political leadership. It is for this reason I call on the political leadership of this country to rise up to the task to deliver our democracy from the cradle of populism. All will be lost if we can’t demonstrate the capacity of democracy to deliver broad-based economic prosperity. Political leadership have for so long undervalued the frustrations of the young people of this country, instead focusing on electoral success and false sense of security.

The spirit of revolution stalks this nation. But 1979 must be the rallying cry of all true democrats in this republic to make the case for democracy.

Former President Mahama a couple of weeks ago at annual conference of his party’s professional’s forum rejected claims that the National Democratic Congress (NDC) does not appeal to intellectuals in the country. He indicated that the party had the academic power to take on any party in any sector of the economy.

This assertion by the former president is in sharp contrast to a claim made by the former parliamentary candidate of the national democratic congress in Ayawaso West Wagon, John Dumelo in an interview with Umaru Sanda in the run-up to the elections last year. John had indicated in that interview that the NDC didn’t ‘believe a lot in intellectuals like others do’. He was unjustly pilloried for it in the heat of the electioneering campaign. Perhaps, Dumelo could have expressed his thought in a better way but I essentially agreed with the spirit of his sentiment.

But was John Dumelo, right? Who really is an intellectual and do we need more of them in our politics? The essential question is, what kind of intellectual was ex-President Mahama referring to?

The American conservative social theorist and fellow of Stanford university’s Hoover Institution gave a very poignant definition of who an intellectual was, in his book, ‘Intellectuals and Society.’ He defined, an intellectual as a person “whose occupations deal primarily with ideas.” An intellectual’s work begins and ends with ideas. Adam Smith never ran a business and Milton Friedman never run a central bank. They were intellectuals. Ideas, as such, are not only the key to the intellectual’s function but are also the criteria of intellectual accomplishments and the source of the often-dangerous seductions of the occupation.

One can infer from Mr.Mahama’s statement that it seems to be a source of pleasure to have ‘intellectuals’ aligned to the course of a political party. Indeed, it appears it is a source of a perverse pleasure for activists to parrot such sentiments.

I have a word of caution though for you, my fellow citizens who hold such similar views. It is not a very good thing to have intellectuals in politics. I must however sound a word of caution at this stage. I recognise the enormous role intellectuals play in shaping public discourse and thinking.

I have argued before that it is no easy task for an intellectual to become useful to a politician. I do not say this as a criticism of politicians or mockery of intellectuals. It is however the reality of political life. However, the practical realities of political administration which requires politicians to take crucial decisions daily considering various factional interest, something which runs anathema to the training of intellectuals. Intellectuals seek to or are interested in understanding things whilst politicians by the nature of their trade must deliver on things. A politician who understands a problem but lacks the initiative to marshalling the solution to fix the problem won’t enjoy much political support irrespective of how he/she communicates the issue effectively.

The nature of intellectual enquiry which is at the core of the thinking of the intellectual thrives on getting facts right, reviewing scenarios under changing circumstances and possibly never getting anything done. But as stated earlier, a politician must get something done. The capacity to focus on the practical question requiring political judgment is lost on most intellectuals. The ability to distinguish between the theoretical optimum and practical feasibility isn’t an easy one for intellectuals to grasp. We must therefore be careful in how we are courting intellectuals in the political arena. Of course, we must make use of much of their knowledge, but we must be careful not to foist misfit, idealists into arenas they are ill-prepared for.

Despite a comprehensive ban in place since March 2019 against the logging of rosewood tree, the northern part of the country is still experiencing the menace of rosewood plundering. Rosewood is now endangered because of this aggressive logging.

Just as in the illegal mining known as galamsey, foreigners, particularly Chinese, with their local collaborators have succeeded in capitalising on the ineffectiveness of our state machinery to enforce our law and acting with impunity. They have come to realise that enforcement of our laws is weak with punishment non-existent in most cases and in the few cases where punishment is meted out legally, they are usually weak and feeble. Much of our policy response to the menace has mirrored the helplessness of our policy framework in other areas of critical national importance.

Much of this is emblematic of the incompetence of the Ghanaian state. I am left wondering how long we can bear this incompetence. It is imperative that we come to terms with the fact that these acts of destruction are doing harm to the prospects of our future generations.