Ghana Day 8

For a day that I thought was going to be my most boring yet, today turned out to be pretty darn exciting.

Until around 2 or 3pm I did nearly nothing besides surfing the web and downloading episodes of Dollhouse to watch in all the spare time I surprisingly don’t really have at home. Our paper today ran some interesting stories though, that provide a good backdrop to my day’s events. Firstly, one of the former NPP ministers of something or other was detained without charge for 10+ hours by Ghana’s FBI equivalent for a while (probably in a corruption investigation), which drew a pretty big crowd of protestors who were upset at what they saw as the harassment of the opposition. My paper took the same view as the crowd (although that’s not terribly surprising, as I shall soon explain). On another slightly undemocratic and much more interesting note, two of our reporters were detained for 6 hours for sitting outside a minister’s residence and eating peanuts while they waited for him to come home. Apparently they were sitting in an unmarked security zone. Rather than being shooed off, they were brought into custody without a phone call or anything of the sort. A higher up eventually (after a couple hours) said they were free to go, but the security guy in charge of them more immediately decided he was on a power trip or something and didn’t release them. They got out eventually when the afternoon shift replaced the morning guys.

Finally, there has been some controversy about a Ghanaian national holiday that was banned in 2001, the June 4 celebration. On June 4, 1979 (30 years ago today), Flight Lt. Jerry John Rawlings took over power in a military coup. He was the one who eventually (in 1992) held the first free elections, which he subsequently won (twice). As I’ve explained I previous posts, he’s a pretty controversial guy. In any case, when the opposition came into power in 2001 they decided (probably rightly) that the anniversary of a military coup, regardless of how much it was designed to bring probity to government, was inappropriate for a democracy to celebrate. It was thought until a few days ago that this holiday would not be revived, but we found out for sure and certain today that in fact the 30th anniversary will be marked with much gusto.

So it turns out democracy is not perfect in Africa’s only country that has passed the two-turnover test. Ah well.

So besides listening to as much of the gossip about these and a few other stories, collecting business cards, and composing a survey of media freedom to try to con people into answering, I thought my day was going to be unproductive. This was particularly true because apparently my news editor was off looking at bodies in the morgue (or something) all morning and only appeared intermittently in the afternoon. Just when I thought I would give up and go home early, however, he showed up again and I had the opportunity to rush him and ask if I could help cover the June 4 stuff. He said ok, in fact that’s what he was trying to get my colleague Awudu to go cover – I had not realized it, but this evening there was an NDC rally. So with much complaining and grumbling from Awudu, we set off.

The grumbling, I soon found out, was because Awudu and the photographer who went with us were the two unfortunate detainees. Sad for them, but I have to say I thought it was pretty cool that I got to cover a story with the guys who made the news that day. He was annoyed that he was being sent to yet another event where he believed he was going to be harassed (whether or not that belief was merited). I never found out if he would have been though, since he stowed his journal in my bag to avoid detection as a journalist and used the white girl as cover – nobody questions the white folks.

So on the way over I got to grill Awudu about what he thought of things. Firstly, the impression I got from my first day’s reading of the paper was entirely well founded – the paper has a marked pro-NPP bias and is certainly anti-NDC (party in power). This explains why national government people aren’t happy to see us. I asked if this meant that pro-NDC stories never appeared in the paper, and he said no, they cover good things NDC does – they just never make the front page. His reasoning for why the paper liked NPP is that the NPP allowed much more media freedom than the NDC had done during its stay in power. Later, however, the photographer (who is pro-NDC) told me that he thought the NPP allowed media freedom only to keep its real actions out of sight and use the media for untruthful propaganda. Awudu told me that the media house they’re in is actually about 60% pro-NDC, but the newsroom itself is mostly NPP. Awudu claims to be mostly NPP, but thinks there are lots of good people in the NDC. So it seems like a mixed bag, but with a definite bias in the Guide.

Awudu said that in general, the media is free and can print whatever stories it likes. Even though the NDC (who had maintained criminal libel laws) was now back in power, it couldn’t really touch anyone in the media without having everyone on its back, as evidenced by his own detention.

The rally itself was interesting but not amazing. As with most rallies, it was full of propaganda and singing and playing up the crowd, which usually obliged the speakers by shouting and cheering wildly and once storming the stage. The people who spoke were notable, although since I’m pretty new to Ghanaian politics I don’t think I really appreciated it as much as I could. The attorney general (a woman) spoke, as did the majority leader in parliament, some big shot business guy, the youth organization’s leader, and Rawlings’s wife. In typical Ghana/ Africa fashion, it was supposed to start at 4, kicked off at 4:40, was supposed to last an hour with each of 8 speakers taking 5 minutes each, and continuing until around 8pm. At least it was a nice, air-conditioned venue.

Lots of ambassadors showed up, but Japan and Spain were the only mostly democratic countries in attendance that I caught– it was Iran, Libya, Ethiopia, DRC, Cote d’Ivoire, Togo, Equatorial Guinea, Algeria, and a couple others. Seemed like most of the democracies were distancing themselves from the event.

One positive thing I learned was that (at least for that particular event), state funding was not used (although the venue was state-owned, and I’m doubtful they paid for the facility). It was done with private contributions by party members.

We got back too late for the story to be published tomorrow, but it’s likely it will show up on Friday. I’m theoretically helping to write it, although Awudu apparently likes to be a pundit, pick out the few blunders in every speech, and highlight those for the readership – so I’m not positive I’ll want my name on it. We shall see though.

One other exciting thing happened, which was my taking the tro tro home late at night. It was fine, except for a guy who really desperately wanted to be gangsta sat down next to me and gave me look-over. I’m pretty sure he’d been drinking. Anyway, he tried to pay my fare for me (without telling me – discussing it in Ga with the tro tro guy and then handing off the cash), so I had to force my fare on him so he wouldn’t feel like I owed him anything. I also told him the wrong stop I was getting off at and fairly loudly called Grandma to tell her I’d be home soon. So with all my bases covered I was fine, and thank god he didn’t get off at the stop with me (since he’d already claimed to be getting off at the stop I said I’d be leaving at).

So tomorrow (today for you readers) is the actual holiday, and I’ll be going to see Mr. JJ Rawlings himself speak in I’m sure a huge crowd of people. Should be another fun day. Then Friday I’m off and we’re visiting Cape Coast and some other things, so this will probably be my last post until next Monday. But be sure to keep an eye on the Guide for more stories : )