First installment from Ogyakrom 2007!

Ogyakromian Chronicles – Summer 2007

Wow! Another journey into Africa, My Africa; My Accra; My Home that I loove; My Heart! This is where this little heart of mine is! I tell you no lie, I loove this place. Honestly do. Crazy it is, but there’s no place like it. I mean … … where else will you find potholes so large that the water would be more than enough to fill up and power up a beloved hydroelectric power system that is currently on its knees? Ei! Akosombo nkanea paa oh. Hmm. As for our energy troubles, we’ll muse over them and dissect and discuss them later. For now, all I can think of is the intense nostalgia and flood of emotions I get from my visit home – kinda bittersweet with a good dose of pleasure and pain. Pleasure because of some of the strides we’ve made and the little things I’ve missed since my last visit. The pain comes from seeing the backward steps we’ve taken and how sure the promise seems to be, that we have a loong and torturous journey ahead of use. Anyway, allons y! There’s a lot going on out here. Where do I start from? … …

Well, I got into Ghana just in good time to start the month of June. I usually sleep late, so I was up around 4:30-5am and listened to a radio call-in program. That was my baptismal into Ghana 2007 and the realities on the ground. … I was amazed at the volume of call-in Christian programs where a whole lot was being offered – prayers, counsel, “consultations,” taunts and much more. Hmm. Na wao. My first stop was on Hot FM or Peace FM – one of the stations, can’t remember which, with Osofo Kum ChaCha. Okay, hearing the name, I honestly thought I was listening to a spoof of some religious program. Thinking it was a joke, I had such a good laugh at the name of the pastor and the kind of calls that were coming in to the program. As he gave directions to his church at Mataheko, asking people to come for nsenkyerenee and consultation, it dawned on me that the program was for real. A carpenter called saying he wanted or needed favor in his job, etc. he quickly asked him to come for “consultation” as soon as the sun came up, and to bring his tools to the church as well. He added directions to the church. Another person called, and after explaining her plight or whatever concerns she had, he asked her to go buy bananas and groundnuts and come for consultation. Ei. This is where I remembered some old t.v. programs and films where fetish priests gave lists of items to people to bring. All I could think of was … maan! “Nana Nyankopon, yere sei wo dzin papaapa oh. Fa hen bon kye hen.” Indeed, we’re abusing and dishonoring and just destroying the name of God.

Okay, so a woman called in about having problems with an unfaithful husband. She asked what she was to do, and he basically asked her to deal with it and ‘krorkror’ and pamper the man and not fight with him when he comes home. Ei! This is a reflection of the approach we use, where the woman is told that as for men dieh ‘saa’, and so they should just deal with it. Man sleeps around, beats you to pulp, you tell your family, and you’re told to deal with it. This way of dealing with it, stems from our cultural and religious backgrounds. The longsuffering wife … if you’re not going to ask her to walk, at least empower her to deal with the situation; to do something for herself. Get a job if she doesn’t have one, take care of her children, if he’s neglecting his responsibilities. Instead, she’s told to deal with it. Another woman calls and says she’s ready for marriage, but men come and then leave. Kum ChaCha asks her if she’s a little pretty, and says yes. He asks if she’s sure, and says she should go and buy 40,000 cedis worth of bananas and 10,000 cedis worth of groundnuts and come and see him that morning. Ei! What kind of consultation aah is this?

A guy called about a dream he had where he had made soup with crabs and snails, and Kum ChaCha just burst out laughing hysterically. After his bout of laughter, he proclaimed that the guy was being troubled by a spirit of setback. He asked him to put his hand on his nose and then spoke some words over him and added the usual closing statement – come in the morning for consultation. I tell you, the calls come tumbling in like a waterfall, and it’s no joke at all. Some guy called and said he’d been having nightmares. Remedy? To come with 7 sachets of pure water. Someone else called from Winneba, and Osofo KCC asked if he could make it to the church for consultation, and the guy said not till Sunday. Osofo said well, he couldn’t help him until he showed up at the church, and hung up. Another guy insisted on getting prayed for, even though he’d been asked to show up for consultation. Here’s Osofo KCC’s prayer: “pray, Jesus! Byebye!” and he moved on to another caller.

There’s also apostle/prophet/osofo (dunno which title is correct) Oduro Kwame, a.k.a., “spiritual man.” These are the few I heard on radio my first night home. There are tons of them. those who primarily interpret dreams, those who offer ‘consultation’ and those who pray for callers. There are the good old, Bible-based pastors who minister on the radio and t.v. – Rev. Owusu-Ansah, Bishop Dag Heward-Mills, Bishop Agyin-Asare, Rev. Mensah-Otabil and others. Hmm. As for the abundance of latter day prophets, apostles and miracle workers, it all sounds like a game – like a spoof of radio evangelism programs. Unbelievable oh! What this says is that people are hungry and desperate for God, for answers to their problems etc, and sadly, they turn to people like these who see the need and capitalize on it. Sad testimony of what Christians have allowed to happen.

The news in Ghana now is no new news – energy troubles. We have public utility crises for real oh – electricity and water. In Ashaley Botwe, we haven’t seen water run through our taps since 1995/6, and we’re still waiting for our miracle. There is so much talk about the energy crisis, and our “Ghana moments” of blackouts. Hmm. First of all, I say this with great passion, there is NO reason on planet earth, why we should continue to be dependent on hydroelectric power! Why do we sit and observe with our pair of God-given eyes aaah till the water level drops in the Akosombo Dam and then resort to rationing power? Apparently, Tarzan (Wereko-Brobbey) foresaw this crisis coming, but was silenced one way or the other. Hmm. The dam was built eons ago, and was supposed to handle a temporal problem while we sought more permanent solutions. Nkrumah had a vision, and we’ve been sitting on that vision, refusing to get up and see new visions. The population since 1957 has doubled, so why, why, why are we still dependent on this same dam? We wait for the rains to come, and when it’s strong enough, it runs off the ground and erodes and destroys our roads etc. I’m not an engineer by any means, but I can at least think of the problem and make some suggestions, that is, besides the suggestion that a responsible government must replace the actual equipment that powers the dam – turbines etc… There’s also the need for water harvesting – rather than lose all the rainwater, we could channel water into pipes that feed the Akosombo dam – it is worth the investment. Large underground pipes with very few openings (we don’t want to clog it like we clog all the gutters in the country), going as far around Akosombo as possible. I have heard some politicians speak of alternate energy sources, zooming in on nuclear energy. Are you serious? Kidding me?! I have taken this to be a joke of some sort when I hear the vice president and other politicians mention nuclear energy. Even common borla, common trash, common garbage, la poubelle, we have been unable to process into energy, and we want to go nuclear? Where will be build plants? How will we maintain them? What do we do when our non-maintaining, careless selves allow something to go wrong? Do we all get fried as a result? Where will we dump our waste? In fact, lemme move on … not worth wasting energy on (no pun intended) – at least not for now.

Solar energy! If any continent on the surface of planet earth is to produce experts in solar energy, it has to be Africa! We have sunshine in abundance, so what are we waiting for? We have no excuse, good people, no excuse. When I raise the option of solar energy, I hear people say that solar is too expensive. Hellooo!!! It is an investment, for crying out loud! A responsible government that has gone begging for money from everywhere, and has spent millions of dollars on Ghana@50 celebrations cannot possibly try to convince me that they cannot start doing some serious R&D into solar energy, get engineers to start building solar panels, and then subsidize cost for people and for public consumption. Street lights and traffic lights at least, should be solar-powered. This is nothing impossible. If we can fund Ghana@50, we can fund solar power! How about using the wind for energy? How about using bio energy from all the trash that litters our streets? We don’t have to use the same energy source. Where the wind works best, go for it. Communities that can use bio energy, go for it. As for solar, we all have pleentey of it. We have to think far ahead – African myopia is seriously killing us, and I ain’t jokin’ around with this. Drives me nuts!!! The Burkinabes have built a dam across the Volta, so that limits our supply already; never mind the rain-dependency. What are we going to do for energy? Ok. … Lemme get off that bandwagon for now. I know I’ll have more than enough reasons to return to the topic.

Our energy troubles have lead to the widespread use of generators and converters/ inverters, whatever they are called (like car batteries that can be hooked up to appliances etc. Some people don’t use their generators etc also because it attracts armed robbers who think there’s money in that house, and so attack. I tell you, people steal electricity wires to sell oh. Can you imagine that? Was hard for me to. One story that has had me go bezerk is that of someone’s goodwill gesture that was brushed aside by government. One businessman, Azumah Banda said he had imported industrial-sized generators for Korle Bu. These were a gift to the hospital, not generators that were being sold. When the machines got to the Tema Harbour, he was asked to pay duty and taxes etc. on the equipment. It is so ridiculous that it sounds like a joke. The man left the machines there saying he’d done his part to make those machines available – the government/Ministry of Health/Korle Bu had to do the rest to get them out of the harbour – how can government insist on duty on equipment that is given to help a hospital that is in dire need of power?

Are you surprised that our doctors and nurses leave to work elsewhere when they have to use torchlights to perform surgery? I keep telling people that this outflow of health personnel is not just about salaries. That’s a simplistic way of looking at it. The working conditions are key! No consistent electricity or running water. I tell you, we have some of the world’s best doctors oh. They are serious miracle workers who do much with very, very little. Many would stay if we improved their working conditions for starters. Granted, they have their own issues – disrespecting patients and intimidating them etc. That’s a whole new conversation. That however doesn’t change the fact that we must make their work easier however we can. There’s so much work to be done in the area of health care. I’ve heard some glowing reports about how effective the National Health Insurance Scheme has been, particularly in the districts and rural areas. In urban places like Accra, it’s a different story altogether. It’s a noble start, and I look forward to seeing what becomes of it. Hmm. Let’s move off health, or else this entry will never get done.

One complaint we all have and hear about incessantly is traffic. Ei, nkran krom ayeh congested papa! I tell you no lie. The number of cars on the road is growing, but our road networks stay the same in terms of size etc. Granted, the main roads like the Tetteh-Quarshie-Legon-Madina-Adenta road is being widened etc, but that and a few other major roads are being widened, and the other 95% of roads are terrible. Absolutely horrendous. Of course the politicians who go over these same roads can’t feel the frustrations because sirens whisk them through traffic, and their foreign shock-absorbing cars keep them safe from jolted and shaken bones as they travel. We need help oh. Traffic is killing us on the Abekah-La Paz road, Spintex road and many others – forget about Circle kraa. It’s crazy. Whenever I fly over places, I look down at evidence of urban planning or the lack thereof. From the sky, you see the places with meandering roads and no properly laid out pattern or grid. Such is the story of Accra, Kano, Freetown, etc etc. In a nation like Ghana, a truly responsible and forward-looking government should start working on building a basic grid of roads across the country – one from north to south, right through the middle, and at least 4 running east-west from top to bottom of the country. It takes forever to travel anywhere in the country, and this mustn’t be so. Ghana@50 takes priority huh? Begging for money all around the world and digging a deeper financial ditch is all we seem to do well, and we beam with pride that whenever our president and ‘father’ travels, he comes back with borrowed goodies. I have more to say on these grants and loans and how that hurts our policymaking sovereignty, but will reserve that issue for a while.

Still on road networks – what’s the deal with our love for roundabouts? We have them all over, there are always battles going on around them, and methinks life would be easier and less chaotic if we just had intersections with working traffic lights (solar-powered). The “the value is the same” public education campaign seems to have been very popular and successful, and could be used as a model for public education on tons of issues – environmental health and keeping the nation clean, driving habits, etc etc. What brings this to mind is the strategy of using public education as a tool to create a sense of proprietorship in the public when it comes to public infrastructure and utilities. What I mean by this is … through such campaigns, a progressive government would explain to the people in concrete terms, how toll roads can help with the construction and maintenance of roads, even using the Motorway as an example, and start building some of these trunk, inter-regional roads, preparing the public to pay tolls to use these roads. The convenience they offer will draw road users. Those who don’t want to use them can stick to local roads, but I believe that quality will give way to complaints about cost, and to ensure that money collected goes in the right place, we could put into place, automated systems – exact coin change etc etc… In our little, upside-down world, we build houses and kiosks before we build roads, so our roads have to meander round buildings. It’s like building the superstructure of a house before laying a foundation – of course, the whole thing is bound to collapse!

Talking about roads brings another thing to mind – a major, major, major problem we have – land system – partition and sales, registration, documentation etc of land in Ghana is the nightmare of all nightmares. I won’t even go into the horror stories. We need some serious land reform bi paa eh, e no be small joke. In doing this, we have to acknowledge and mitigate the complexities – we have to involve the chiefs who sell the land, and all the middlemen involved. There has to be a set procedure/process that is streamlined. Rather than going to see chiefs who sell the same piece of land multiple times, we can first label all the land – give them zone and then plot and sub-plot numbers or something (it’ll be an expensive effort, but it’s worth it. It takes money to keep things going, we must learn). Anyway, give plot numbers to all the existing land, so that if anyone is interested, they can go to the Lands department and inquire about the plot number (where will we fix plot number signs, since our drainage system actually facilitates flooding and the washing away of landmarks? Hmm). The Lands Department can then tell them who the rightful owner is, so that the interested buyer goes to see that land owner – chief, family, individual etc….. any unclaimed land etc can be given special codes to facilitate the process etc. This may be a far cry from what can quickly or cheaply be done, but at least, we MUST start addressing the issue! We’ve sat and observed and complained about the chaos long enough. I hope the Ministry of Public Sector Reform, the National House of Chiefs, the Lands Department and all other relevant entities are going to work on this in a non-partisan way to ease the craziness where land is concerned.

Recently, there were raids on houses, kiosks and other structures that had been built in waterways, causing or aggravating flooding whenever it rains. It was tough, seeing the destruction (Adenta Japan Motors area, for e.g.) of people’s homes etc, but then it was a necessary move because of the hazard posed, especially after residents themselves kept saying that this wasn’t the first time their houses were being destroyed. They had refused to yield to the calls to move because they didn’t have anywhere else to go, but had been warned of the pending destruction, and had apparently experienced it all before. It’s serious paa oh. We need serious work done in this area a.s.a.p.

One thing we desperately need is a tracking and addressing system. We can’t track violaters of the law, evaders of taxes (big corporations, street sellers, store owners, politicians, self-employed consultants and all), hit-and-run incidents, crime etc etc… We can loan money or do legit business because we can’t trust people we can’t track. Doing business in good faith has proved not so helpful, so something needs to be done. There’s no panacea for our problems, so our best option is to tackle it one step at a time, taking all issues on at the same time and working on them little by little. It takes wisdom and much grace, I tell you. We need nothing short of miracles!

I honestly feel sorry for African leaders and governments – the task is so daunting and intimidating, one wouldn’t know where to start from. I won’t talk about the need for sound political leadership in Africa. It’s an imperative, and we have examples to learn from – South Africa’s Nelson Mandela, Tanzania’s Julius Nyerere, Botswana’s Seretse Khama and Ketumile Masire; Congo DRC’s Patrice Lumumba, Mauritius’ Seewoosagur Ramgoolam, there’s also Ghana’s Kwame Nkrumah and perhaps a few non-presidential but positively influential leaders like Wangari Maathai, Kofi Annan, and others. Political leadership is a need, not a want, and an imperative. I could go on about it, but for now I will let it rest. I’d challenge anyone reading this to look out for information on some of these leaders I’ve mentioned. The good ones slide by unnoticed, and it’s the Bokassas and Amins, the Eyademas, Mobutus and Abachas that we remember. It’s good to read up on these leaders and see what they’ve stood for, and the visions they fought for. Africa needs leaders with visions, and one may say we have some alive – Senegal’s Abdoulaye Wade? Ghana’s J. A. Kuffour? Mali’s Amadou Touré? Liberia’s Ellen Sirleaf-Johnson? They may be the best we have (maybe the lesser of the existing evils to pick from). Have much to say another time. For now, moving right along …

Each time I look around, I see that the retail business keeps expanding – everyone is selling stuff that other people have made. We are not manufacturing, processing or refining anything, and we still live in a world that smacks of colonial mono- and agro-based economies where we export a few raw materials, and then turn around and buy processed products from these same raw materials. I perceive a dire need to invest in manufacturing and processing. Diversifying exports and focusing on processed exports is a better choice for us, and who ever said we needed to learn from the West only? We can look to the East, and look at the models that worked for them. Take South Korea and the other Tigers for example – they stuck to their guns and followed through on their policies, which included rapid industrialization through the adoption of Japanese-styled accelerated industrialization, protectionism (high tariffs on imports) and export promotion to rich industrialized nations, foreign investments in bond holdings, etc. You see, they were able to grow local industries by limiting the encroachment of foreign products into their market, and by the time they opened the market up, they had developed homegrown industries to a level where they could compete.

Our case is unique – we have begged for and received so much money that has so many conditions tied. It’s not just the ERP/SAP programs pushed by the Bretton-Woods institutions that had conditions. These plenty loans and grants and packages we receive, because of the shaky accountability systems, all come with agreements – contracts, some of which force our markets open to the influx of foreign goods. Competition is good, but the kind of competition in the system now is the kind that does not enable our local industries, but kills them. Heavy subsidies to producers in China, the U.S. and other places, they can afford to make and sell products like soap, biscuits, toilet paper, toothbrushes, electronic products and many other consumer goods to us at dirt cheap prices. This hurts local producers, who don’t enjoy such subsidies, and have higher production costs, and so have to peg their prices accordingly to break even. Lowering their prices in order to compete with the made-in-China products means producing at a loss. Talking about competition and the open market is not restricted to consumer goods. Services – banks, telecom services etc etc face similar problems. We sit down and watch foreign business come in and make mega bucks and take that tuck that away in their pockets, and then we sit and whine. Yes, it’s a good thing that there’s open competition, but it is killing our local manufacturers!!!

Talking about foreign investors at the expense of local investors brings to mind one sad example. When I got to Ogyakrom, within a few days, I had heard different people mention a new shopping centre called Game. It took me a while to understand that it was a shopping centre, because each time I heard of it, and of how people go there just as a pastime, it sounded like a recreational spot to me. I was confused – do they have game parlors? It is a collection of stores or just one store? Is it a place to take children to play? My questions were many. Well, one day, a friend took me there to see for myself. It was such a painful experience, and I meant it when I told her we had to leave there quickly or else I’d cry. The store – Game, is basically like Wal-Mart or K-mart, where they sell a wide variety of goods. The entire structure is a shopping mall that is yet to see other stores. It currently houses only the large South African store – Game. I asked myself – so why do we alllllways sit down for foreigners to make money off us? We flock to Game, Koala, MaxMart, Woolworths, On The Run and many other foreign-owned stores, giving them our money day in and day out, when we do not see competition coming in from local investors? There are tons of Ghanaian millionaires – and when I say that, I don’t mean cedi millionaires. I mean dollar and pound sterling millionaires. What stops them from setting up alternatives to these stores? The ‘finesse’ we see in these places, for lack of a better word, makes us feel like it’s so similar to what one would find overseas (abrokyire), and we revel in that, but what about having Ghanaian alternatives?

You’re telling me that our millionaire businessmen cannot build shopping malls, and if they are practitioners of Corporate Social Responsibility, stock these stores with made-in-Ghana goods? Come on now! The first response to this comment I often make is that they won’t make money. It’ll mean operating at a loss because the Ghanaian mentality encourages us to buy foreign goods. As for the debilitating mentality, I have much to say about it, but I’ll leave it alone for now. If we can invest in Ghana@50, and can launch a successful “The value is the same” campaign. What stops us from promoting Made-in-Ghana goods and conscientizing our public about the importance of supporting our producers? Once upon a time, a certain president told his “fellow countrymen” to stop patronizing the business of his political rival, Appiah-Menka. Eyi ara yeh asem? Politricks alllways get in the way, I tell you! We must support and promote local manufacturers! I seriously don’t know what I’d do without key soap. Nothing like it anywhere! Launch a campaign that promotes our local industries. This will also make the competition real, and force them to start improving the quality of their products, because at the heart of the matter, people buy foreign products not just because they are foreign or cheaper, but sometimes (often), they are of much better quality. This reminds me of what I want to say about R&D in Africa. I’ll address that next. Lemme finish this section first. The price differentials I saw in Game were horrendous! There was this wire baby bather that would cost between $2 and maximum $3 in the US, at the most. This dollar store caliber product sells for about $10 at Game. Incredible! It’s a serious rip-off paa oh. Serious. It made me so, so sad. Especially at how we’ll rush there seeking to enjoy in the elitist pleasures of shopping at such a place, and give them our money. The profit they’re making, when you look through their products is not just 10% or 20%, but 100 and 200% profit, and that’s a crime, I tell you. A heinous crime. Are the wealthy Ghanaians who have traveled and seen such establishments thought of coming to create competition to places like Game etc for a modest profit unlike the daylight robbery we see coming from the current foreign investors from South Africa, Lebanon, India, China etc? Drives me nuts, I tell you; drives me nuts. God save me from high blood pressure. Amen. products?

I have been thinking a lot about educational reform at the tertiary level. It’s another crucial subject that needs attention. Currently, there are about 20 universities in the country, including the 4 oldest ones – Legon, KNUST, Cape Coast and Winneba. They all “offer” the usual courses – business, law, admin, engineering, education, etc., to mention a few. The first thing that needs to be fixed is the system ‘offering’ certain courses – students are basically pre-selected into programs based on the incoming academic performance. People select from a limited number of options, what they would like to study, and then the university decides to ‘offer’ their choices or assign different majors. This perhaps is done thinking of the volume and availability of faculty members, space etc. Well, we are producing the same kind of scholars, and there is usually the leaning towards medicine and law, admin, engineering, computer science, architecture and very few other ‘traditional’ options. It’s no secret, though it’s a huge mystery, that we still have a system that selects people to study science or general arts. Because of this system, there’s always been the stereotype that the ‘smart’ who excel in the sciences are ‘guided’ (pushed) into that field and are allowed study the sciences. Those who cannot make the cut for sciences are then ‘guided’ towards the arts. As a result, two stereotypes result. Smart ones do science, daft ones do arts. This is the prevailing pattern in our secondary as well as tertiary institutions. People study subjects that are of no interest at all to them, often because the system selected them into those areas of study, or parents and other adults pushed them in that direction. Some have sacrificed years of medical education (what I call a life sentence with painful labor), and once given the choice, have left medicine to enter fields where they have a true interest – business, law etc… Those who end up studying African Studies, Archeology, Geography etc., often do so because it’s ‘offered’ as their only option, and are often stigmatized. We produce people who have no interest in what they spent 3, 4, 5 or more years of their lives studying.

What we need is a system that offers choices and allows students to choose what to do. being able to explore different fields and pick what one wants to study can be a driving force behind excellence in academics, and this is what prompts and pushes people to create jobs for themselves. Our current system basically grooms people for existing positions, period. The most it does it prepare people to repeat the status quo. A system that guides students into studying what they really want to study will generate scholars who are interested in their self-selected disciplines, and will be a wellspring of creativity, innovation, and much progress for the nation at large. Take for example someone who is interested in computer sciences. In our universities, they may be taught how to develop software or assemble hardware. If such a person has an interest in sports, health science, etc, they will be motivated to actually design computer programs and software for our health industry – hospitals etc, or develop software that will help in keeping sports information, recording and playing back games etc. etc… If we produce graduates who are interested in their fields of study, they will find it easier to be innovative and apply themselves – to create new niches for themselves and grow those areas of industry. You see, rather than copy blindly from the West, what we can do is copy the progressive things that have pushed people around the world forward.

Allowing people to explore disciplines at the tertiary level means exposing them to as many disciplines as possible while they are in secondary school, and giving them some orientation before they pick majors and pick classes at the university level. This means not devaluing any major at all. Archeology, zoology, geography, agricultural science, anthropology and history are all important and crucial, central to our development. Why sit we here, while some researchers from a university in the US or in Europe to write our history for us? We complain that our schools miseducate us because crucial topics are glossed over, history is distorted etc. Well, if this is important to us, then we must begin sponsoring our teachers and committees of educators to write textbooks. We must write our own history and our own experiences in all the disciplines and not gloss over topics such as the slave trade, traditional/herbal medicine. We must inspire people to study archeology, so that rather than having foreign archeologists come and get all our artifacts and put them on display in their Louvres and Smithsonians for us to pay and go and see, we will be inspired to invest in our own museums and generate money from our own artifacts etc. on display. Why should we go and bring in foreign firms to draw maps of our cities? First of all, we don’t invest in urban planning, and so the task is super difficult, and anyone asked to design a Geographical Info. System or draw maps of our cities etc will charge an arm and a leg to clean up the mess we create. We can invest in our students, perhaps even sponsor them to go elsewhere to study GIS, Health Information Systems, Meteorology, Cartography, Tropical/ Herbal Medicine African Music etc etc, and guarantee them jobs when they return. This way, we are not training scholars to fit in status quo fields that already exist, but we’re training them to create relevant positions for themselves and others.

The issue of R&D comes up again. I can’t stress enough how important it is for us as a people to invest in Research & Development. It takes money, it takes patience, it takes diligence, it takes many trials to develop products, people’s talents, ideas etc etc. If I had the money, one thing I would be sure to invest in, is R&D – create a research fund that supports R&D. The African mentality sees it as a waste of time to develop products and keep testing them to assess and improve their quality. As things stand, an African will most likely not see any sense in building an otherwise perfect model of something – a car, or even small consumer products, and then destroying it through crash and durability tests. This explains why we have all those low quality products on the market. In fact, one think I would love to sponsor and facilitate if I could, is the learning process from other global south contexts. See how our global south counterparts have done it and also make inroads to fixing our problems and moving forward. R&D, be it in the production of consumer goods, or developing intellectual capital is crucial. Solar energy, malaria and AIDS research, herbal medicine, etc etc are all areas that will benefit immensely form R&D and help us to make progress.

Coming soon .... Ghana finds oil? Walaahi!