Friday, July 17, 2009

Ghana Day 51

My day was not quite as I had predicted. I decided in the morning to go to both of the programs and only be a reporter at one of them, so I set off for the Center for Democracy and Development (CDD) and its domestic election observer report launch at 9am (it started at 10am). I finally got there at 11 after some really terrible direction-giving by lots of people along the road and the secretary of the place who I talked to on the phone. At one point I was told to go to 2nd avenue (and was evidently directed to the wrong 2nd avenue, since every neighborhood of course decides numbering its streets is the best idea), and I got let off at a bus stop halfway between two roads along the motorway. I asked the girl who was selling phone credit which one was 2nd avenue, and she told me “this is second avenue!” like I was an idiot. All of my explaining/ clarifying really just led me to the conclusion that the bus stop was called second avenue but there was not actually a street by that name, and least not recognizably by the people there.

I really miss well-labeled streets and gps.

So I didn’t end up getting much out of the talk, since when I got there it was ten minutes away from Q&A. But now I have seen the CDD, which is good, because they’re the sort of place I’m likely to want to know about. Also, I think I could maybe sort of find my way to it now. I also have the report they released, which I’ll read over in a bit, because the reporter who actually covered the story didn’t really want it.

The second event of the day was at the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), which is I believe a graduate school of the type I would enjoy attending. The talk was by a Prof. Frimpong (possibly spelled with an e and not an i) who is the dean of the School of Governance, Leadership, and Public Management. He was a very engaging speaker, and his lecture was about Obama’s speech and its implications for governance in Africa. He started off with a pretty amusing story that described Obama’s rise to office in biblical terms with Obama as Jesus (although occasionally Moses). He was trying to make a point that the perception of Obama is as a divine being is rather funny and that it really took hard work to get where he was. I was hoping he’d go a little further to debunk the jesus image, but there was definitely nothing even remotely critical of Obama (or even more humanizing than discussing his lineage). I’m not sure anyone here wants to hear anything negative about him.

I thought one of the more interesting things to come out of his talk was his application of Obama’s policy of democratic commitment to regional institutions like the AU, which he said were useless as they stand because they are ruled by dictators. He advocated throwing out any leaders who weren’t constitutionally elected. Not terribly realistic, but I asked him what his practical solution was and he said the democratic countries should form their own club, so to speak.

My evening has been much less exciting than I had hoped; the theatrical performance was canceled for rain (which hasn’t occurred all week – I guess it’s just-in-case cancellation). I’m pretty bummed about that, but I suppose I did get to see one play while I was here and that’s mostly good enough.

2 comments:

  1. DEBUNK the Obama Jesus image? What???!!!
    As Dad will surely agree, you're being blasphemous. ;)

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  2. Dear Miss Lindsay,

    I have a question. You said the other day (I'm not sure if it made it on the blog) that you'd been interviewed by the radio station about Mandela's birthday. What were the chances she was looking for a native white Ghanaian? Are there such things? Would it be difficult for a white person to immigrate and set up a business?

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