How Accra Celebrated Independence Anniversary
By Poku Adaa, our correspondent who was in Accra.
Produced by Harunna Attah, the current Director of the Film Corporation, it showed the early days of the revolution when cocoa was being carted by student and youth groups, then the activities of PDC's in checking smuggling across Ghana's borders. At one point, young men in khaki shorts suddenly sprung up from beside way- side bushes to attack bicycle riders carrying loads on their pillions.
The work of the Citizens Vetting Committee showed Ato Ahwoi in close-up singing the praises of the committee in their campaign to arrest tax dodgers. Alone in a hall that looked like a church, he recited virtues of the committee: "The CVC is mainly a revenue-collecting institution which has successfully increased government revenue by allowing guilty people to confess their crimes in secret instead of publicly exposing them. There was Mawuse Dake, the grey-haired Marxist propounding theories about how village and cottage cadres and organs of the revolution have contributed to the success of the revolution. Finally, the exodus of Ghanaians from Nigeria attributed enormous credit and praise to the PNDC, PDC's and WDC's for the magnanimity bestowed to their unfortunate compatriots.
Obed Asamoah beaming with smiles talked about the altered images of Ghana in international relations. The programme ended with Ephraim Amu's verse on the Ghanaian patriotic song: "Yen ara asase ni" (This is our own land).
On the day of the anniversary, the proposed address to the nation by Flt-Lt J. J. Rawlings was postponed to the early evening "when all households have electricity". The early morning was the parade at the Independence Square where school children from Accra-Tema marched past the Chairman of the PNDC and leader of the Revolution against the background of religious music and the commentators praises of the aims and direction of the revolution. "Governments have come, governments have gone, but the PNDC remains as steady as a rock in the helm of affairs".
The PNDC Chairman's speech at the parade supposedly aimed at the youth was the usual rhetoric, a preach of morality to the youth, a castigation of the educational system that has bred a morally decadent youth and wreaked hardship on the children of our future generation.
The rest of the afternoon was for the Ghanaian populace still unabashed, still unfettered by the growing canker of political ineptitude around them. Labadi Pleasure Beach was the scene of joyous activity with picnic goers and carefree holiday makers. Right from Osu towards Tema, traffic was at a complete standstill with parked cars virtually choking the road to a halt. "Ghanaians are a remarkable people, resilient and full of smiles even in adverse perversity" said one happy-go-lucky chap saturated with beer at 80 cedis per bottle.
