Dictators on the run

Thanks to the "Third Industrial Revolution” which according to Joseph Nye is based on rapid technological advances in computers, communications, software",  smart phones, and advanced transportation systems poltical activists world wide are making illegitimate, undemocratic, and corrupt regimes highly uncomfortable and most of the dicators like Ben Ali of Tunisia, Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and Gaddafi of Libya are on the run. Countless anti-democratic governments in the Middle East have been forced to think twice and many have began to implement policies that will benefit their citizens.

That is how virtual power has done to our world.

Debating the Africa Union

As the divided Africa Union struggles to find solutions to the crises in Ivory Coast, Somalia, and DRC and remains completely silent over the crises in Libya, Tunisia,and Egypt, the questions many are asking are whether the AU will ever be counted upon as a body that should be taken serious at all and whether the AU can redeem its battered image?


Will Africa ever forge a common identity and defence policy? Can Africa recognise its strategic importance and can it ever take advantage of that strategic importance? Can the AU be made more democratic, more relevant and be more responsive to the needs of its citizens? What will be required to make Africa the next engine of global development?


The crises in Libya, Tunisia and Egypt have exposed the hollow in the Africa Union as a continental body that can respond to the challenges of the 21st Century and has created doubts in many who once believed in its capability to provide solutions to the problems facing the continent.


Lord Adusei

Ghana: Our destiny is not poverty

On 6th March 2011 during the independence celebration I spoke to many Ghanaians and everyone has something to say about the poor state of the economy, the lack of effective leadership, the poor delivery of public services, the lack of unity among the youth, the corruption at CEPS, the begging mentality of the politicians, the sycophancy of our ministers etc.


Someone asked "When are we going to stand up and say enough is enough? So there is no one in the ruling NDC who is visionary enough to lead the party and take advantage of the huge benefit Ghana is getting from the sale of gold, cocoa, and oil?"


Another also asked"So there is no one in the NPP who shares the visions that led Dr. Nkrumah to build Tema City, Akosombo dam, KNUST, Cape Coast University, and the factories that employed many Ghanaians?"


One also asked "Why do we mine gold yet we beg for silver? Why do we produce cocoa yet we beg for chocolate?"


Another poignantly asked "Is poverty our destiny?"


My answer is: No. Our destiny is not poverty.
Our major problem is: Leadership!!! We are poor because of leadership. Leadership has affected the way we think as Ghanaians. It has affected the way we see ourselves now as Ghanaians and even the future as Ghanaians. It has affected the way we craft economic and education policies. It has affected the way we embark on infrastructure development. It has affected the way we fight poverty and corruption, and the way we embark on industrial development. Nations and institutions blossom when there is effective leadership. I saw it in Nkrumah. I have seen it in Kofi Annan and in Dr. Afari Gyan of Ghana's Electoral Commission. 


Let us get a visionary leader like Nkrumah and there will be another Akosombo dam, another Tema city, several secondary schools, and several factories for our unemployed youth to work. Let us get a visionary leader and the children selling ice water in Accra, Kumasi, Tema and Takoradi will be in the classroom learning. As of last month Akuffo Addo was talking about Akans instead of Ghanaians. That is how our leaders think. 


It is our duty to train the next generation of leaders who will truly love Ghana and develop it for all its citizens.
You can be the next effective leader of our dear Republic only and only if you do not see Ghana in terms of tribes, in terms of party politics, in terms of north and south, east and west, in terms of language and in terms of ...You can be the next leader if you see Ghana in terms of its total development i.e. building its roads, schools, industries, telecommunication infrastructure, housing, health, and making the benefits trickle down to all its citizens irrespective of where ones live.


How would you have managed Ghana if you were President Mills? Would you have used our gold, our oil, our rich land, the sea and rivers to develop Ghana? Would you have built another factory to process the tomatoes that get rotten anytime there is bumper harvest? Would you have improved the railway infrastructure in Accra, Kumasi, Tamale, and in Wa etc to take care of the congestion in our cities? Would you have worked hard to get another Akosombo dam to take care of our growing demand for electricity? Would you have exported raw gold to London or would you have added value to it before export? How about Cocoa would you have exported the raw beans to Holland? What would you have done if you were President Mills? Would you have appointed all your ministers from the NDC?


By Lord Aikins Adusei

Social Movements versus Corporate Greed

The power of Social Movements is growing and it is putting governments,corporations,global institutions (IMF,World Bank,WTO) and market systems (capitalism:free market, globalisation) on their toes. The Social Movements are serving as the antibodies of our threatened world. They are protecting the earth from toxins of globalisation,corporate greed, unfair trade, huge subsidies in the global north, carbon emission and environmental degradation that is wiping off livelihoods of the poor in the global south.

Thanks to Global Witness, Global Financial Integrity, Transparency International, Green Peace, Friends of the Earth and many indigenous movements in Africa, Asia and Larin America the corporations are accounting for the pollution they cause around the world.

Supporting Democracy in Africa

Democracy is not just a word. It is the wheel through which both the poor and the rich are given the opportunity to influence decisions that affect their lives including education, jobs, electricity, housing, transportation, and all the freedoms known to mankind. But recent developments in Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, Cameroon, Gabon, Ethiopia, Gambia and Ivory indicate that achieving democracy always come with a price. Since January protests have rocked the North African states of Tunisia, Egypt and now Libya. Similar protests have taken place in Gabon and Cameroon. The protesters have embraced jet fighters, helicopter gunships, armoured carrier assaults, water cannons, camel charge, tear gas and police brutalities.

Thousands have died. But we cannot remain aloof while thousands are massacred for demanding the right to elect their leaders, to speak their mind freely and to have access to basic necessities of life. Our silent means victory for the autocratic regimes littered across the continent. The people of Libya need our support. They need our prayers, and our encouragement. Let's us support them. Join Africa for Democracy now and let the world know how you feel about it.

Globalisation and the poor in the Global South

According to Joseph Nye of Kennedy School of Government there are many components of globalization including social globalization (fast information), environmental globalization (global warming/climate change), military/security and finally economic globalization.

Joseph Nye notes that “What economic globalization does is it tends to create a good deal of inequality. Some people get ahead while others don't get ahead as quickly or at all.”

In the advanced countries those who don’t get ahead as quickly as possible  or those that don’t get ahead at all are protected by the state through programmes such as social security, unemployment benefits, health insurance, disability benefit, study stipends, fuel/energy allowance and other safety nets. These programmes help to reduce the negative and destructive impact of globalization on their lives. On the other hand such safety nets do not exist in the global south including Africa and therefore people are more exposed to the destructive impact of economic globalization.

This is what worries many anti-poverty activists. The demonstrations in North Africa and the Middle East and its impact on fuel prices show that the world cannot ignore the inequalities that come with economic globalisation especially its devastating impact on people in the global south. 

The question is: How do we protect those in the global south that do not benefit from the wealth that economic globalization creates so that they do not react negatively to offset the wheel of globalisation? How do we create opportunities and avenues for the poor to fully participate in the  game of globalisation? What role can governments, corporations and civil society play to ensure that the poor are not left behind?

By Lord Adusei 

Facebook activists are two steps ahead of world Intelligence Agencies

It is understatement to say that the recent revolutions and uprisings taking place in North Africa and the Middle East caught the intelligence community and their political masters off guard. The intelligence community is asking why they didn’t get to know that the poor were planning to overthrow the allies of our governments in North Africa and the Middle East. They wish they had known the intensions of the poor so they could inform the corrupt, insensitive and autocratic regimes to erect firewalls around themselves. 

French General Directorate for External Security (DGSE) had no idea how poverty and corruption were uniting to overthrow their friend in Tunisia. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had no clue what the Egyptian poor were up to regarding the $1.3bn given to Mubarak to buy his cooperation and likewise the Italian Agency for External Information and Security (AISE) had no idea what was going to happen to their friend in Libya.

While Al Qaeda and the Taliban were on the radar screen of many of the intelligence agencies, it appears the Yasmin revolution planned and executed on Facebook caught the spy agencies by surprise. Facebook activists it appears have been steps ahead of the world's finest spy agencies.

It will be no news if we hear tomorrow that the corrupt and autocratic regimes in Angola, Cameroon, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Republic of Congo, Uganda and Zimbabwe have been toppled without the spy agencies having a clue.

By Lord Adusei