Lord Aikins Adusei

How about the state of the housing infrastructure? A visit to any village or town gives the same picture of poor housing and poor quality of public service. People are living in mud/thatched houses with bamboo/raffia leafs as roofing sheet with no electricity, potable water and clinics. They live in a subsistence environment without social security, health insurance and are condemned to poverty, desperation and hopelessness. Those living in urban areas are without jobs, without mortgage, and face high utility bills with poor public services. They face constant barrage of water and energy disruptions everyday. In every region the situation is not different. Go to Nima, Agbogloshie, New Town, James Town, Sodom & Gomorrah and see the kind of living conditions and environment in which fellow Ghanaians are living in this 21st Century. People are living in squalid conditions not even fit for animals yet we have NDC and NPP always promising to build us castles, swimming pools and what have you.

Ever since Obama's visit a lot has happened in the country. Barely a day goes without an opposition member been arrested and detained by the BNI or someone been beaten to death or shot dead by the Police and the BNI. Ghana is slowly joining the likes of Zimbabwe where the state security apparatus arrest and detain Movement of Democratic Change MPs or members at will. Like Guinea where life has become so cheap that Ghana's ambassador was attacked by the state security forces, our nation too is slowly turning into a police state with the BNI arresting and detaining people and interrogating them without their lawyers being present. We are told that Lawyers who followed Asamoah Boateng to the BNI were pushed and heckled by operatives of the Organisation. The lawyers were also not allowed to sit in during the BNI meeting with their client even though the laws of our land dictates that a person must have his lawyer present when been interrogated. Even though the BNI claims to have secured a bench warrant for Asamoah Boateng's arrest his lawyers were not shown a copy of the warrant.

Ghana has been experiencing serious disruptions in the energy sector for years and no political party has seen any wisdom to solve it. As a result factories are folding up and are laying off workers and we are waiting for nature to help fill Akosombo Dam before we rectify the problem. Will this do nothing approache to problem solving help our nation? What are we doing with the abundance of sunshine in the country? We have not taken advantage of it, have we? We have sunshine 365 days and we have not tap into solar energy which is cheap and more reliable than hydro. Nations in Europe that are locked away for most of the year by cold winter take advantage of the short summer to tap into the energy potential of the sun while we have the sun throughout the year. It is another indication of the useless institutions that we have and lip service paid by the various political parties and their leaders to Ghana's development.

Nigeria could have been the United States of Africa isn't she? She has all the resources: oil, gas, rich soil, a hardworking population but what do we see? Corruption, embezzlement, utter incompetence, political assasination, coups, election violence, environmental destruction, arm robbery, fraud, internet scam, religious conflict and tribal affiliations have eaten the better part of what should have been a great nation. DRC a nation with a third of the world's natural resources yet what we see in that country are chronic poverty, malnutrition, massive official corruption, scant accountability, dictatorship, destruction of infrastructure, and wars which resulted in over six million deaths between 1998 and 2009. Gabon could easily have become the Switzerland of Africa but her leaders have turned the oil blessing into a curse with poverty, corruption, embezzlement, waste, mismanagement, dictatorship, sitting very deep in the country. Equatorial Guinea could easily have become the Singapore of Africa but her leaders have turned it into the usual African story of corruption, embezzlement, waste, mismanagement, dictatorship, poverty. Libya could easily have become the California of Africa but 39 years of one man's dictatorhip brought nothing but international isolation, wars, terrorism, scant accountability, coersion, fear, intimidation, arbitrary arrests, detention, force imprisonment and what have you.

However, of all the victims of Swiss banking secrecy laws and her shady banking practices, developing countries and Africa in particular seem to have suffered the most. The global infrastructure of international financial secrecy with headquarters in Switzerland has helped bleed trillions of dollars in illicitly generated money out of Africa and the rest of the developing world. The activities of Swiss banking institutions and real estate companies have plunged third world nations into debts, poverty, misery, malnutrition, diseases, economic meltdown, infrastructure decay and political instabilities through the help they give to corrupt politicians, civil servants, the business elite and corrupt multinational corporations who collude and connive with the corrupt entities to loot and hide the proceeds of their ill-gotton gains. Many third world countries especially those in Africa lack the infrastructures needed to run successful economies. They lack schools, hospitals, roads, harbours, rail infrastructure, irrigation facilities, electricity, clean water, telecommunication, sanitation facilities because of the loots. Many children are orphaned and malnourished and many do not have access to education and healthcare because money meant for all that are stolen and are sitting in Swiss banks such UBS, Credit Suisse. There has not been a single corrupt politician or dictator in Africa, Latin America and Asia who has not had dealings with this secretive alpine country. While third world countries continue to struggle to provide the basic necessities of life Swiss economy is washed with money could save millions from hunger, starvation and diseases.

Also the lasting environmental damage the corporations will cause Ghana and the ultimate price Ghanaians will pay for the destruction of the ecosystem and the pollution of their soils, wells, lakes, lagoons, rivers as well as the destruction of fish stock that have made environmentalists to worry and as a result gearing up for a long battle. Already the global environmental destruction caused by these corporations is estimated at $1.8 trillion with oil and mining countries in Africa sharing about a third of that. In Nigeria as is in many other places Shell has refused to clean up oil spills that have polluted rivers, lakes, lagoons and soil with the people enduring the health hazards posed by it. Anyone who visits the Niger Delta Region will find it hard to come to terms with the poverty, deprivation, collapsed infrastructures, environmental destruction and the billions of dollars Shell and her counterparts make in that country annually. The only thing that has kept millions of poverty stricken people surviving is a belief in God and a hope of a better life after death.

There are few institutions in Ghana and in Africa that can hold its head high when it comes to discharging dispassionately its constitutionally mandated duties and there are many that are under performing or have no accomplishments due to corruption, partiality, and inability to stand the pressure from politicians. However, Ghana´s Electoral Commission has been just one of the few to have defied all those negativities. The Commission stands tall among all the civic institutions in Ghana and Africa tasked with preserving democracy, political pluralism and constitutional rule. It is one of the few institutions in the continent that has not given in to political pressure, threats and intimidations which have brought violence and destruction to so many countries in the continent.

Apart from their support for corrupt regimes, the Bank and IMF prescriptive policies have also played a huge role in entrenching poverty in the third world. Worth mentioning are the structural adjustment programme and trade liberalisation which were sold to the poor countries by these financial institutions and supported by the western economic saboteurs. The fact is that the SAP and trade liberalisation among others were ill formulated, implemented and monitored with the results that countries that embraced them have all lived to regret. The SAP forced onto poor third world countries by the Bank and the IMF forced their governments to abandon their support for the public sector with serious devastating consequences to the health, education and agric sectors. The withdrawal of farm subsidies in particular made it difficult for farmers to produce to support local consumption or compete with their rich Western counterparts who receive billions of dollars of government subsidies every year. The unrests and disturbances over food shortages and high food prices that occurred in Egypt, Haiti, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mauritania, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Eritrea, Somalia and Sierra Leone in 2008 were the direct result of the Bank and IMF bitter pills prescribed to these poor countries.

Why are we poor? The World Bank and IMF claim to provide vital financial support to poor countries to help them alleviate poverty but more than fifty years of loans to these poor countries, poverty is still decimating them. So what happened to all the billions of dollars that the World Bank and IMF have provided to the world's poor? Could it be that the Bank and IMF give the loans and then turn round to force these poor countries to use it to service old and illegitimate debts? Could it be that the Bank and IMF give the loans to corrupt regimes who then deposit the money in their private banks in Europe and then ask the poor people who never benefited from the loans to use the little resources they have to service the odious debts? Could it be that the policies and solutions often prescribed by the Bank and IMF are toxic to the economies of these poor countries? Could it be that the loans are used to pay the so called technical experts that the Bank and IMF often send to the poor countries as advisers? Could it be that the loans are given with conditions that benefit the creditors and not the countries who borrow the money? Can the World Bank and IMF explain to the World why so many poor countries remain poor after they had received tens of billions of dollars from them? How do multinational corporations doing business in Africa pay for the resources that they exploit? Do they pay the governments with arms and military machines for use to oppress the people? Shell has been sued in the US for complicity in the hanging of Ken Saro-Wiwa and other environmentalist in Nigeria. Could it be that such complicities by multinational corporations, IMF, World Bank and Western governments are the result of the chronic poverty in the resource rich countries of Africa?

The health of every nation´s economy is strongly dependent on a reliable infrastructure system because infrastructures are the bedrock, life blood and the engines that drive the economy. The role play by infrastructures in the economy of a nation cannot be overemphasized especially its effect on sustainable development, foreign direct investment flow, GDP growth, inflation reduction, job creation, trade, agriculture, delivery of goods and services, lowering cost of business, improving health and standard of living and poverty reduction. Therefore, efficient and effective provision of infrastructure in a nation underlines all attempts to reduce poverty.It is obvious that lack of infrastructures are the cause of the poor economic performance and poverty seen everywhere in Africa and there is no doubt that without heavy investment in infrastructures it will be very difficult for Africa to make any progress towards economic independence. Increasing access to water, sanitation, roads, electricity, railways, trams, inland water transport system, airports, harbours, telecommunication, canals, and providing improved seeds, credits, subsidies and irrigation infrastructures are essential to Africa´s economic and social development, for without them it will be impossible to reduce poverty and improve both urban and rural lives.

If those indicted in Africa have committed any crime surely they must face the consequences of their actions but it will also be an injustice if those supplying the weapons and bankrolling the conflicts are allowed to go unpunished. I do not accept any law or any notion that make certain people who commit crimes untouchable while others are pursued vigorously for committing the same crime. If we want the world to be peaceful for all mankind to live in and pass it on to future generations, then institutions like the ICC tasked with ensuring that peace should not be selective, biased or partial or perceived to be biased towards a certain class of the earth's citizens. No one should be treated or made to feel s/he is above international law when it comes to things that matter to the whole world, not even United States President. No nation no matter her economic, social or military capabilities should be treated differently when it breaks international law. No individuals no matter the office that s/he holds should be exempted from prosecution if he or she breaks international law. It is by upholding this principle that the ICC will be seen to be credible, impartial and unbiased. For what is good for the goose is equally good for the gander.

Despite decades of independence, availability of natural resources and existence of technology to make good these rich resources, Africa is still the poorest continent on earth. Today Africa is a continent where majority of the people live on one dollar a day. Africa is a continent where people die for lack of food, potable drinking water, and against common preventable diseases. It is a continent where malnutrition abounds and few children under the age of five survive the menace of the six killer diseases. It is a continent where child mortality is high and life expectancy is low. It is a continent where people walk several miles for water and children have no access to education and medical care. It is a continent where rural life is nothing but a condemnation to poverty, misery, desperation and hopelessness. It is a place where people live in mud/thatched houses with bamboo/raffia leafs as roofing sheets. It is a continent full of wars and armed conflicts. It is a continent where democracy and rule of law are a myth. It is a continent full of dictators and kleptocrats; a continent where corruption is handsomely rewarded and achievement is shunned; a place where entry into public life/service is a means to acquiring wealth.

We have been fooled for quite too long. We must vote for candidates on merits rather than party and tribal affiliation, for this is what has made Europe, America, Japan, Korea what they are today. We have been told that Africa is poor while our leaders receive several billions of dollars annually. We must ask them to tell us how those billions of dollars have been utilised. We must not rest until Africa becomes a continent for all her citizens not just a few. We must not rest until the continent becomes free from leadership incompetence, corrupt, weak, ineffective and despotic rule. At this critical moment in world economic crises Africans cannot afford the same old faces, the same old ideas, the same old politics, the incompetence, the corruption, the nepotism and we cannot afford to remain poor in the abundance of natural resources.

Anytime Transparency International (TI) releases what it calls corruption perception index (CPI) showing which country is more corrupt and which ones are not the top 10% of most corrupt nations always come from the developing world with most of the so called advanced countries given a clean sheet. T...

The colonisers used their majority votes to dictate to the Bank and IMF on how these former colonies should be helped. (Of the 185 members that make up the IMF, six colonial masters and their allies made up of the United States, Germany, Japan, United Kingdom, France, Italy control 42% of the votes). The colonial masters dictated to the IMF and the Bank that for Africans to be helped, they must open their economies to allow European corporations in. This underscores the numerous conditionalities that are associated with loans from these institutions. The conditionalities are nothing more than a smokescreen designed to ensure that Europeans never loose their grip on the resources of the colonies. Some of the conditionalities include instituting secrets memorandums of agreement, subsidies to foreign corporations and massive tax concessions (such as income tax, usage fees, property tax) -the primary source of revenue for "export-oriented" developing countries.

It is not uncommon to see poverty stricken Africans in poor living conditions being shown in documentaries, movies, and television screens in the West but the same documentaries and movies are always silent on the role play by the institutions in the West. Bribery as we all know involves a giver and a taker but it is always the taker who is reported in media. In many instances as we shall soon see bribes are offered in order to secure contracts, secure official favour or to induce officials in order to influence the out come of government decisions. In other instances people become corrupt because of the existence of favouring conditions as can be seen in most western countries with their banking secrecy laws.

Ghana, the first nation south of the Sahara to gain independence has been left behind in everything that concerns human life. Fifty years of dictatorships, coups, political instabilities, misrule, economic mismanagement, endemic corruption, lack of transparency, scant accountability and the weak application of the rule of law has resulted in Ghana marking time while other countries mostly our independence peers have moved forward economically and socially. Our education, our health system, our environment, roads, electricity, water, agriculture and above all our economy are all behind. We still wash our clothes with our hands and our farming practices are still dominated by the use of cutlasses and hoes, tools our great grandfathers used before they were colonised.

A google search for possible role model candidates led to Mobutu Sese Seku, Sani Abacha, Iddi Amin Dada, Gnassingbe Eyadema of Togo, Samuel Doe of Liberia, Charles Taylor, Emperor Jean-Bedel Bokassa of Central Africa, Ibrahim Babangida, Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia, Lansana Conte of Guinea, Museveni- Uganda, Milton Obote of Uganda, Bakili Muluzi, Laurent Kabila, Kwame Nkrumah, Jerry John Rawlings, Blaise Campore, Arap Moi, Hosni Mubarak, Omar Al Bashir, Gaddafi, Omar Bongo, Obiang Nguema, Sassou Nguesso, Eduardo dos Santos, Francois Bozize of Central Africa, Yahya Jammeh of Gambia, Iddriss Deby of Chad, Valentine Strasser of Sierra Leone, Mwai Kibaki, Mengistu Haile Mariam and Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia.

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Corruption is one of the most formidable challenges to good governance, development and poverty reduction' in Africa says 2008 Transparency International Report. It has been said that corruption in Africa is like an advanced cancer or tumour that cannot be treated. Like cancer, corruption has tr...

Dear Presidents/Prime Ministers, On behalf of the poor people of Africa, I send you this protest letter. We are angry. Yes we the people are very angry. We have endured your ill conceived, harsh and austere economic and social policies for quite too long. We have watched silently to see yo...

published in Is the ICC targeging Africa and Third World Countries?

published in Multinational Corporations: The New Colonisers in Africa