Monday, 13th September, 2021

DAILY ANALYST
Monday, 13th September, 2021 Page 5
‘Coodeta’; the spoilt
child of ‘yentie obia’
By Haruna Atta
The pathetic and
bewildered look says
it all. A broken man.
Only a week or so ago,
everything was at his
beck and call as president of the
Republic of Guinea. His orders
were being barked here and
there, in fact, everywhere, and
uniformed security personnel
would snap to attention, saluting
away even if it was only his
shadow they glimpsed flashing
by.
He was a powerful man, a
very powerful man. His satellites
were many – family,
friends, time-servers, and
others, describing all sorts of
orbits around him. He and his
satellites exuding power, arrogance,
and wealth! Owners of all
that they surveyed… His words,
quoted and repeated ad nauseam
by the media, especially the
state-owned ones, were more
or less law. He travelled widely
abroad, enjoying all the creature
comforts not available to the
ordinary taxpaying citizen.
At international regional and
sub-regional summits, a very
exclusive club, hosting countries
treated him and his colleagues
like deities. The privileges associated
with his office were thick
and juicy! Don’t get me wrong,
I am not being a spoilsport, nor
am I being jealous or envious.
On the contrary, I think, with
some amount of moderation, the
office deserves all that to allow
the holder to serve his people
with integrity, accountability,
competence, and incorruptibility,
and know when he had
expended his welcome to leave
the scene – in Ghana’s case, after
two terms.
I believe in his case it was
the same, until when he decided
that he alone was the anointed
and decided to amend the constitution
to allow him to be on
top indefinitely, and then…
Coodeta!
I first heard of coup d’état on
a windy, dry savannah on February
morning in 1966 when I
was a little schoolboy attending
Navrongo Secondary School. Our
headmaster, a feisty Scotsman
called Robin Crawford (later the
Rev) that morning, called an
emergency assembly.
The whole school, including
the teaching staff, trooped to
the assembly hall, which at that
time also doubled as our dining
hall. Even before we had settled,
he delved into his mysterious
reason for assembling us in such
an emergency fashion. He said
to us that news had just come
from Accra that President Nkrumah
had been overthrown in a
‘coodeta’.
Classes would not continue,
and we were all to proceed to our
dormitories and remain calm.
End of Assembly. We trooped
out the same way we came in
with ‘coodeta’ ringing over and
over in my head and wringing
my curious ignorant mind into
all sorts of knots. There was
no going to the dormitories, as
we gravitated in clumps to our
different groups to learn some
more. There was an old “redif-
fusion box” somewhere in the
entertainment area where the
senior boys had taken positions.
Every now and then, some of us
would tear away from our peer
clumps to this senior one to listen
to the “rediffusion box” and
read the lips of our seniors.
The box itself was blaring
mostly military-style music. It
was from one of these seniors,
a distant relation that I finally
got a hang of coup d’état and
the man behind it, a Colonel
“Kiteku”, and true, that’s how
that one also twisted itself to
my tongue. The coup d’état of
February 1966 and Colonel Kotoka’s
role are now an indelible
episode of our history, for good
or bad, but by popular acclamation,
for bad…After that, we had
the coups of 1972 and 1981, with
a “housecleaning revolution” in
1979, a palace coup that removed
the coup maker of ‘72, and the
palace coup-makers themselves
who were all scythed in the
house cleaning, not forgetting
the number of attempted coups
thrown in to add to the flavour
of coup making in Ghana.
“Serves the fool right!” in
2021
The overthrow of President
Professor Alfa Conde of Guinea
came to me from a friend
through my WhatsApp – the
“rediffusion box” having gone
extinct for decades now. As soon
as I finished reading it, I sent
a one-liner to him: “Serves the
fool right!” This is a man who
refused to see all the wrong
turns he was taking, plunging
his impoverished country into
more and more under development.
He was a typical example of
words that have become very
symptomatic of many African
countries, sadly including
mine at the moment: impunity,
arrogance, corruption, abuse of
power (especially, the electoral
process), destruction of state institutions,
treating the constitution
with contempt (for example
defying its intrinsic secular
nature with the imposition of a
so-called national cathedral as
the “mother church” of Ghana
to act as the focus of everything
Ghanaian). And much, much
more.
It is right we abhor and
frown upon ‘coodetas’, but our
governments must also reign
in their inordinate lust for the
abuse of office – something Frema
Busia described in a recent
commentary as “yentie obia”!
I don’t know, but maybe, it was
just a Freudian slip or living in
denial, but the ECOWAS statement,
originating from Ghana,
could not bring itself to accept
the Guinean coup and referred
to it as an “attempted coup”.
They must mend their ways,
for somewhere, not far off, only
an AK47 barrel away, a coup
maker may be lurking, using
“yentie obia” as his casus belli,
which for my country, I say, God
forbid! Never again! To the credit
of the Guinea coup makers,
they did not harm the deposed
head of state in any way, with
the exception of his dignity,
which is in tatters, what with
all those embarrassing pictures
of him that have gone viral.
Video clips have also appeared
showing former ministers and
appointees of the former government
being taken away with
taunts of “thieves, thieves” from
the public.
It is also worth noting that
the coup was peaceful, something
we cannot say of Ghana’s
2020 elections, which registered
deaths and injuries, with the
culprits still roaming free.
Ambassador Alhaji Abdul-Rahman
Harruna Attah
Every modern economy
and society is developed
through the concept of
digitalization/Digitization.
Digitalization is transforming
the ways in which industries,
businesses, agricultural products,
general goods and services are
marketed, distributed, traded,
delivered and consumed in an increasingly
digitized economy and
marketplace globally and Ghana
is not an exception.
Online marketing, trading,
shopping, banking and e-commerce
have become the mainstream
channels for consumers.
Products, goods and services are
moving from tangible mediums
to digital ones.
In Ghana, the sustainability of
government flagship programmes
such as Planting for Food and
Jobs, and One-District-One-Factory
would largely depend on
digitalization, how the ministries
and companies involved in the
programme be able to effectively
and efficiently adopt digital technologies
to promote and market
their products and services to the
local, African and Global markets
for profits.
The easy accessibility and
availability of the products and
goods from the 1D1F and Planting
for Food and Jobs on the market-
Bawumia's digital agenda Key
places through digitalization, the
greater the profits and sustainability
of the programmes. ...to creating technology entrepreneurs
However, it is important to
state that in an increasingly
ment is capable of rolling out a
digitized economic environment, comprehensive Programme on
companies/industries which are Digital, Internet and Technology
established around the concept of Entrepreneurship leading to the
digitalization create trillions and creation of world-class digital and
billions of dollars to support the technology entrepreneurs who
national economy in terms of jobs would be able to provide the needed
platforms to market, distrib-
and wealth creation.
Digital, internet and technology-driven
companies such investments aimed at ensuring
ute, trade and attract the needed
as Amazon, Apple, Microsoft,
the sustainability of the government's
flagship programmes,
Google, Tencent, Visa, Mastercard,
Facebook, Alibaba, Twitter etc. especially 1D1F and Planting for
are economic giants in their own Food and Jobs envisioned, initiated
and implemented by H. E. Nana
capacity, having economic growth
and financial impact greater than Akufo-Addo.
the entire economy of African
The Digital and Technology
Countries.
Entrepreneurs would assist the
This is one of the main reasons
why Akufo-Addo's govern-
socio-economic architecture of
government to transform the
ment through Dr. Bawumia is Ghana, compete fairly with other
doing everything possible to, first global digital and technology
Through Dr. Bawumia's digitalization
initiative, Ghana would and Technology Entrepreneurship
shall become the Hub of Digital
of all, formalize and change the entrepreneurship platforms such
Ghanaian economic architecture as Amazon, Tencent, Alibaba, Microsoft,
Apple etc.
nology entrepreneurs who would ... Signed...
soon boast of digital and tech-
in Africa.
through Digitalization/Digitization.
Digital and Technology Entrepreneurs
are very key pillars cally reduce the rate of youth
Market/Advertising Psycholo-
help the government to drasti-
Razak Kojo Opoku
Through the efforts and
commitment of Dr. Mahamudu
Bawumia, the NPP govern-
creation and innovation.
Through Dr. Bawumia,
for economic growth, jobs/wealth unemployment.
gist & Licensed I/O Psychologist
Ghana