Ghana Quotes
Nkrumah was one of the great African democrats. Like George Washington, he voluntarily relinquished his Presidency when most would have had him as a “President for Life,” or even a king. His greater vision was one of pan-Africanism. In the defense arena he didn’t realize that the major purposes of most African military was to maintain the existing regime in power unlike his own example. He further assumed that military threats would come from outside the continent as they historically had. However, virtually all the conflict in Africa has been between contending groups within a country and nearby countries taking sides and thus being drawn into the conflict.
Lewis had sent Nkrumah is resignation. He believed that the economic policies that Nkrumah had chosen against his advice, risked economic disaster for Ghana in the long run. Nkrumah had wanted to invest very scarce country resources in “prestige projects” which had high visibility in the country and to the world but really just drained capital and did not develop infrastructure or economic capability of the country. He felt that if the people could be proud enough of their new nation and the world could respect them, the future would be better. So for example, he opened diplomatic missions throughout South America while at that time, Ghana was doing no business with South America. Lewis turned out to have been right, and Nkrumah had gambled and lost. Ghana had very little economic development or improvement in standard of living.
Describing the qualities that make for a successful tribal leader:
He was an Army Major at the time he wrote this article. In 1966 his positive view of Britain was overwhelmed by the anti-colonial fervor that existed in much of Africa.
