Thousands of Ghanaians on Friday, November 26 participated in the much-publicised #FixTheCountry protest.
The demonstrators are demanding among other things a new budget and steps to address the many challenges facing the ordinary Ghanaian.
Clad in red and black, the protestors wielded placards with varying inscriptions including ‘#FixOurE-levyNow’, ‘A new 2022 budget now’ and ‘If Ghana was your personal property, would you run it like this?’, and several others.
The protest is to pile pressure on the government to address Ghana’s numerous challenges, including youth unemployment, poor infrastructure, E- levy and high cost of living.
Henry Nana Boakye, Youth Organizer of the ruling New Patriotic Party, NPP, has averred that persons behind the #FixTheCountry protests have been badly exposed with respect to their motives.
“The #FixTheCountry people have been badly exposed… We had just come out of the elections and there were COVID-19 issues, it did not take long before we heard about fix the country.
“Let us remember that John Dramani Mahama’s election petition also took about two months. It was barely two months after President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo had taken his oath and in March 2021, I heard #FixTheCountry,” he said on Okay FM’s Morning Show late last week.
He, however, admits that there is difficulty in the system but that it is also very exciting to know that the government has plans to employ some 11,000 plus people.
He cautioned politicians to be careful about their pronouncements and added that he was in favour of any counter group that will project the good works of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and the NPP government.
FixtheCountry demonstrations have already happened in Spain and England, and Ghana is next.
It’s coming off on Wednesday, the 4th of August, 2021, and the meeting point is Obra Spot, Kwame Nkrumah Circle in Accra at 7:00am. Put on your mask. Add a face shield if you want to and hit the streets.
Do it for the patients who have to sleep on the bare floor at our hospitals while our leaders have oxygen tanks ready and available in their bedrooms and go for treatment abroad. #FixGhanaHealthService.
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Do it for the poor children still studying under trees while your favourite politician’s children get driven in V8’s to Cambridge curriculum teaching schools. #FixGES.
Do it for the lack of good roads, good hospitals, national indebtedness and the endemic corruption in governance that sees a few people amassing wealth while Ghana remains poor.
On the 3rd of May, 2021, something big happened in Ghana. Something unprecedented. Only the new media could make it possible.
If Joshua Boye-Doe (aka KalyJay) had written a 2000 word long feature in the Daily Graphic about the problems bedeviling the country due to the incompetence of the NPP-NDC duopoly, a few hundred people might have read it and maybe two would have reached out.
But majority of Ghanaians, the young and adult populace on social media wouldn’t have heard about it, and maybe the Daily Graphic wouldn’t have published the article anyway.
The paper that did not see Ejura as worthy enough to feature on its front would have probably hidden a #FixTheCountry article somewhere else–between three electronic goods adverts. I doubt if they would have published it even.
Enter the internet and social media. A reading platform available to every smartphone user, and Twitter, the social media platform that inspires the most hashtags.
It was easier to sound the clarion call with three little words than a feature long article or speech delivered on TV or radio.
KalyJay named a couple of things wrong with Ghana and tweeted #FixtheCountry.
That set the ball rolling. It was as good as Mohamed Bouazizi setting himself on fire in the streets of Tunis. It was as good as Rosa Parks saying ‘my feet hurt.’ It was as good as Martin Luther King Jnr. saying ‘I have a dream.’
Macho Kaaka had a dream as well. He wanted Ejura fixed. He wanted his community developed and its myriad of problems taken care of. His allegiance to community mattered to him more than the party he belonged to. Don’t let his dream die. Keep it alive. #FixEjura.
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Few weeks later, government officials with verified accounts reported KalyJay’s account and it got suspended by Twitter.
That’s the kind of Government you have, Ghana. A government that does not tolerate criticism and sees anybody not singing their praises as the enemy. It’s political vindictiveness of the lowest form.
Joshua lost access to his Twitter account for sometime, but the horse had already bolted. Almost every Ghanaian on Twitter was tweeting #FixtheCountry, using the hashtag on Facebook, and it wasn’t long before a leader emerged, calling on others to join him to petition the police about an intended #fixthecountry demonstration.
The signatories to that first letter sent to the Police were Mawuse Oliver Barker-Vormawor, Joshua Boye-Doe, Samuel Alesu-Dordzi, Efia Odo, Dela Russell Ocloo, Felicity Nelson, Bashiratu Kamal Muslim, Agyapong Forster, Adatsi Brownson, Benjamin Darko, Gabriel Ohene Kwasi Addai, Comedian Warris, Prince Kwaku Addo and Stan Dugah.
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Other signatories have signed subsequent letters and worked and continue working hard to #fixthecountry.
Now, look over the names again. Are they all Ewes? Are they all Akans? Are they all Christian names? Are they all Islamic names?
The greatest mistake ever made by the NPP in 2021 is assuming that Ghana is so polarized, so divided, so politically binary that anybody who supports or identifies with #fixtheCountry must be an NDC member or sympathizer.
Not true.
When I launched my first book in November, 2020, I predicted that both the NDC and NPP will win less than 20% of total votes cast in 2024. Sounds crazy, I know. But it will happen in our lifetime. The Grand Awakening is almost here.
Oliver Barker-Vormawor was a staunch supporter and member of #OccupyGhana in 2014, so why will you tag him as a surrogate of the NDC?
If you are wondering what #OccupyGhana was, I can only tell you that it was a pressure group that was doing in 2014 exactly what #FixtheCountry is doing in 2021, and most of their members are now Government appointees and lawyers who worked on the Agyapa deal. No wonder they think #FixtheCountry is a vehicle created to bring JDM back. They are too short-sighted to see the truth.
That’s the difference between us and them. We were part of #OccupyGhana; they are not part of #FixtheCountry.
