VII.

History

Archaeological evidence shows that human habitation in what is now Ghana dates back to 1500 bc. However, there is no evidence indicating that these early inhabitants were the ancestors of the current peoples of the country. From oral traditions historians have learned that the ancestors of many of Ghana's ethnic groups entered their present territories by the 10th century ad. For hundreds of years thereafter, upheaval caused by the rise and fall of powerful kingdoms on the upper Niger River contributed to population migrations into northern Ghana.

The first of these states was the Kingdom of Ghana, which emerged as early as 500 ad, expanded greatly by the 9th century, and collapsed in the 11th century. The Kingdom of Ghana was located in what is now southeastern Mauritania and southwestern Mali. (The only relationship between this ancient kingdom and the modern nation of Ghana is a shared name. The former Gold Coast was renamed Ghana in 1957 to symbolize its historic place as the first black African nation to gain political independence from European colonial rule.)

The Kingdom of Ghana was succeeded by the Mali Empire and then Songhai. These later states developed commercial links with the people of what is now Ghana. For example, the ancient town of Begho, located on the margin between the forests of the south and the savanna of the north, emerged in the 15th century as an important commercial center. Here, savanna and Saharan goods such as cloth and metal wares were exchanged for gold and kola nuts from the south. Although no part of present-day Ghana was ever dominated by these empires to the northwest, Muslim traders came to influence the affairs of northern peoples such as the Gonja and Dagomba. Most significant was their introduction of Islam.

A.

Early States and Kingdoms in Ghana

The ancestors of today’s Akan speakers settled in the forest region of central Ghana by the 13th century and became involved in the prosperous trade with the north by the 15th century. According to oral traditions, the Ga-speaking people of the coastal plains and the Ewes of the Volta region migrated to Ghana from the east around the 13th century.

By the second half of the 15th century when the first Europeans arrived in the area, the ancestors of most of today’s ethnic groups were already established in the present territories. In this period, the various groups began organizing into states. Over the years, trade contacts with the Islamic states of the north and, later, with the Europeans on the coast contributed to the rise and fall of these local states. The Ga people of the coastal plains organized into an effective political unit in approximately 1500. Islamic trade networks stimulated the development of Akan states, and the Akan-speaking Denkyira people of the southwest rose to become a dominant power by the 1650s. In the northern regions of the country, the Gonja, Dagomba, and Mamprusi contested for political power in the 1620s. However, it was the Ashanti Kingdom, located in south central Ghana, that was the most influential.

The Ashanti people, members of the Twi-speaking branch of the Akan, settled the upland region near Lake Bosumtwi by the mid-17th century. Under a series of military leaders, they expanded and gathered into five major political units. Around 1700 an Ashanti confederacy, under the leadership of Osei Tutu of Kumasi, conquered the Denkyira state. Osei Tutu was declared the first asantehene, the king of a united Ashanti nation. Under his leadership and that of his immediate successors, the new nation expanded rapidly into an empire.

Political relations in the Ashanti confederacy were defined, preserved, and regulated by an oral constitution. The asantehene held power as commander in chief of the Ashanti armies. He had the authority to hear citizens' appeals, and all major chiefs of the Ashanti nation swore an oath of allegiance to him. Rulers of the confederate states, however, were allowed many privileges, including control over the inheritance of land and the right to preside over cases brought before them. Ashanti expansion toward the coast began in the first decade of the 19th century. By 1820 Ashanti held some degree of military and political influence over all of its neighbors.

B.

European Influence and the Slave Trade

The Portuguese were the first Europeans to arrive in what is now Ghana, landing on the shores in 1471. Aware that the source of the rich trans-Saharan gold trade was inland, the Portuguese named the region the Gold Coast. At a coastal village that they named Elmina (Portuguese for “the mine”), they established a commercial mecca, trading firearms and slaves from other parts of Africa for gold dust. Competition with Portugal’s gold trade monopoly soon came from Spanish, Italian, and British traders, among others. To protect their commercial interests, the Portuguese constructed several fortresses. Saint George’s Castle, the most impressive of the Portuguese strongholds, was begun in 1482 at Elmina.

Competition among European merchants on the Gold Coast intensified in the 17th century. In 1637 the Dutch invaded and took control of the Portuguese fortress at Elmina. Farther west, the Dutch seized another Portuguese castle at Axim in 1642. At Cape Coast, the British captured a Dutch stronghold in 1665. Ultimately, the British, Danish, and Dutch emerged as the dominant European powers on the coast. The aggressiveness with which European merchants competed on the coast was not due solely to a profitable gold trade. By the 18th century the Atlantic slave trade, supplying African slaves to European plantation colonies in North America, South America, and the Caribbean, had become a vast enterprise. The slave trade subsequently came to dominate commercial activities in the Gold Coast, as more than 40 European slave-trading fortresses dotted the coast.

The exact number of people taken as slaves from the Gold Coast cannot be estimated accurately. The majority of individuals who were sold into slavery were prisoners from local wars, but others were the victims of systematic slave raids. Also, many local people were enslaved as punishment for acts classified as crimes, ranging from challenging political traditions to infringements of religious customs. In exchange for slaves, local rulers and traders typically received guns and gunpowder.

As a result of the slave trade, powerful states such as Ashanti were able to acquire enough weapons to sustain their dominance. Occasionally, however, coastal Fante states formed alliances to resist Ashanti threats. At times, European powers—the British in particular—were drawn into these local conflicts. Historians agree that the Atlantic slave trade was the cause of many wars in the region.

Britain abolished slave trading in 1807; other European nations followed suit, and the trade dwindled in the mid-19th century. Europe’s ongoing Industrial Revolution led European entrepreneurs to turn their attention to Africa’s wealth of critical raw materials—such as the Gold Coast’s plentiful palm oil, timber, and rubber—and its potential for providing new markets for manufactured goods.

C.

The British-Ashanti Wars

The majority of the Gold Coast’s fortresses were under British control by the early 19th century. Seeking a peaceful environment in which to conduct trade for raw materials, Britain viewed Ashanti efforts to assert dominance as a threat to Britain’s commercial interests and began to intervene in local conflicts. The Ashanti, on the other hand, saw British interference in its conquered territories as infringement on its sovereignty and fought back.

During a confrontation in 1824, the Ashanti army routed a British force and killed its commander, Charles MacCarthy, the colonial governor of Sierra Leone. In 1826 the Ashanti launched an offensive against British coastal positions. They suffered high casualties and were turned back by an alliance of British and Danish troops in a fierce battle on the plains near Accra. The Ashanti signed a peace treaty with Britain in 1831. The subsequent peace coincided with a period of increased European Christian missionary work in the region.

In 1844 the British signed a political agreement with a confederation of Fante states. Known as the Bond of 1844, the agreement extended British protection to the signatory states and gave Britain a degree of authority over them. In subsequent years, additional coastal and interior states signed the Bond. Britain bought all of Denmark’s Gold Coast territory in 1850 and purchased the Dutch fort at Elmina in 1872.

The systematic consolidation of British power on the coast alarmed Ashanti leaders. With the 1872 purchase, the British became the only European power left on the Gold Coast. The Ashanti, who for years had enjoyed friendly relations with the Dutch, lost an important pathway to the coast. Ashanti forces surrounded the British territory and then invaded in 1873. After initial successes, the Ashanti were forced to retreat. An attempt to negotiate a peaceful conclusion was rejected by the British commander, Sir Garnet Wolseley. In January 1874 a large expeditionary force led by Wolseley fought its way into Ashanti territory, capturing Kumasi and then burning the Ashanti capital to the ground.

In a treaty that ended the war, the Ashanti recognized British sovereignty over the coast, agreed to pay war reparation costs, and renounced influence over all the territories under British protection. In return, the British permitted the Ashanti commercial access to the coast. In July 1874 the British proclaimed the coastal territories as the Gold Coast Colony and moved their administrative center from Cape Coast to Accra. In the subsequent years, internal dissention made it impossible for Ashanti to control subject territories. In 1896 Britain attacked and occupied Ashanti, declaring it a British protectorate. The asantehene and several Ashanti elders were taken prisoner and exiled to the Seychelles in the Indian Ocean. In 1899 British forces occupied the Northern Territories, the high plains region north of Ashanti.

A final Ashanti rebellion against the British occurred in 1900. Under the command of Yaa Asantewa, queen mother of the Ashanti state of Ejusu, the Ashanti demanded the return of their exiled leaders. The rebellion was put down in 1901, and Ashanti was proclaimed a British colony. In 1902 Ashanti and the Northern Territories were annexed to the Gold Coast Colony. Thus, Britain became the sole power in the political and economic affairs of what is now Ghana.

D.

Colonial Gold Coast

In the first decade of the 20th century, British colonial authorities constructed a railway into the coastal interior, boosting the colony’s economy. Exports of gold, manganese, and particularly cacao increased. Gold Coast farmers produced so much cacao that the crop supplanted gold as the colony’s most profitable product: In 1927, 82 percent of the colony’s foreign earnings came from cacao. Private British companies controlled almost all export and import interests in the colony.

The colonial government established boards to inspect and standardize the management of schools in 1882. The provision of education in the colony, however, remained in the hands of missionary organizations. Mission schools tended to provide only basic primary education, often only for boys. In the 1920s colonial governor Gordon Guggisberg was responsible for the construction of several coeducational secondary schools and technical institutions, as well as miles of rail lines and roads, and a deep-water harbor at Takoradi. Guggisberg brought Africans into the colony’s civil service and appointed the first Africans to the colonial Legislative Council. These improvements helped create a social environment that fostered the rise of nationalism.

D.1.

Early Nationalist Movements

Organized opposition to British policies took place from the early days of colonial administration. In 1852 coastal chiefs protested the imposition of a poll tax, and in 1868 a confederation of Fante states contested British interference in their local affairs. In an effort to protect the erosion of their traditional rights, the chiefs adopted a constitution in 1871 that was to regulate relations with the British administration. The British reacted by arresting several of the chiefs.

Most Gold Coast nationalist leaders were educated Africans. An organization called the Aborigines’ Rights Protection Society was formed in the 1890s to oppose land bills that threatened traditional land tenure. In the early 20th century, nationalists challenged the arbitrary nature of the colonial political system, which placed unlimited power in the hands of the governor and his appointed Legislative Council. In 1920 Joseph E. Casely-Hayford, a prominent Gold Coast lawyer and nationalist, organized the National Congress of British West Africa. This body of educated persons from Britain’s various West African colonies sent a delegation to the British Colonial Office in London to argue that a colony’s administration should be elected by its subjects. The British government, however, preferred to practice indirect rule, relying on a colony’s traditional chiefs for local administration at the exclusion of educated people. In their various newspapers and at conferences, these early nationalists nevertheless continued to urge the colonial government to initiate administrative changes.

Demands on the colonial government intensified after World War II (1939-1945). In 1946 Governor Alan Burns responded by announcing radical constitutional changes that made it possible for a majority African Legislative Council to be elected. Executive power was to remain in the hands of the governor, to whom the legislative council reported. Even so, the 1946 constitution provided the people of the Gold Coast with a higher degree of political power than anywhere else in colonial Africa. The changes also showed nationalist leaders that their voices were being heard.

D.2.

Kwame Nkrumah

Founded in 1947, the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) was the first nationwide political party to call for self-government. Its leading members included the respected lawyer Joseph B. Danquah and the American-educated socialist Kwame Nkrumah. The UGCC drew support from educated Ghanaians, most of whom were either urban professionals or traditional chiefs. Economic dissatisfaction among the Gold Coast’s Africans, especially those who had served in World War II, resulted in nationwide rioting in 1948. The colonial administration accused the nationalist leaders of inciting the disturbances and arrested Nkrumah and several others. This only served to make Nkrumah a more popular figure and fueled the call for self-rule.

Viewing Danquah and other UGCC leaders as too conservative in their efforts to win independence, Nkrumah split with the UGCC later in 1949 and formed his own Convention People’s Party (CPP). Nkrumah’s watchword was “Independence Now”—an uncompromising policy that appealed to many. The CPP drew populist support from rural and working class Ghanaians, further distancing it from the more elite UGCC. In 1950 Nkrumah announced his “Positive Action” campaign, which consisted of a boycott of foreign business, noncooperation with the government, and a general workers’ strike. Public services were disrupted, and when rioting occurred Nkrumah and some CPP leaders were again arrested and imprisoned.

A new constitution was adopted in 1951, replacing the Legislative Council with a Legislative Assembly, designed to provide rural Africans greater representation. In the 1951 elections, the CPP won a majority of seats in the Legislative Assembly. Colonial governor Sir Charles Arden-Clarke released Nkrumah from prison and appointed him leader of government business. Nkrumah and Arden-Clarke transformed the colonial government into a parliamentary system, and in 1952 Nkrumah was elected to the newly created office of prime minister. The UGCC and several regional-based parties—including the Ashanti-dominated National Liberation Movement and the Northern People’s Party—comprised the political opposition to Nkrumah and the CPP. These groups opposed the new governmental structure, advocating a federalist system.

E.

Independent Ghana

Following intense constitutional negotiations and a hotly contested election, the CPP emerged on March 6, 1957, to lead the government of an independent Ghana. Nkrumah became the country’s first prime minister. The UGCC and several other opposition parties joined together to form the United Party (UP).

E.1.

Nkrumah’s Regime

Nkrumah began his tenure as Africa’s first black national leader with ambitious socialist goals and high hopes. He advocated the rapid modernization of the nation’s economic sectors and pursued several expensive developmental schemes. From 1961 to 1966 Nkrumah spearheaded an ambitious and highly successful hydroelectric project on the Volta. A fervent pan-Africanist (see Pan-Africanism), he declared that it was Ghana’s brotherly responsibility to help Africa’s remaining colonies achieve independence. He was instrumental in the formation of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) as an African political forum. He sent Ghanaian soldiers on United Nations (UN) assignments and supported freedom fighters in countries such as South Africa and Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).

At the same time, however, Nkrumah’s rule became increasingly authoritarian. Soon after coming to power, the CPP-controlled Parliament passed laws to increase the power of the prime minister. The Deportation Act of 1957 made it legal for the government to expel all foreigners who were deemed a threat to the nation. The Preventive Detention Act of 1958 allowed the government to detain persons for up to five years without trial. Nkrumah used these laws to silence the opposition, forcing many dissidents into exile. The constitution was revised in 1960 to make Ghana a republic. Nkrumah was named president, and the CPP was declared the only legal political party. Opposition to Nkrumah grew in the early 1960s, and when Ghanaians felt economic hardships at home, many blamed Nkrumah for his ambitious and socialist programs. He was overthrown in a military coup in February 1966.

E.2.

Ghana Since Nkrumah

Conditions in Ghana worsened rapidly following the overthrow of Nkrumah. The economy was stagnant, and Ghanaians, disillusioned by the downfall of their once-revered founding father, were divided. The National Liberation Council, the cabal behind the coup, put forward a multiparty constitution and handed over power in 1969 to a democratically elected government. Kofi A. Busia, a former UP leader and one of the nation’s leading scholars, was elected prime minister. Busia’s government was economically conservative but failed to improve Ghana’s depressed economic conditions. When a drop in the price of cacao precipitated a financial crisis in 1971, his government raised prices and interest rates while devaluing the currency, causing massive inflation. In January 1972 Busia’s government was ousted by another army coup, ushering in a decade characterized by severe economic decline and acute political instability.

The leader of the 1972 coup, Colonel Ignatius K. Acheampong, banned political activity and established a ruling military council. Military control was relaxed slightly in 1974, and a civilian political affairs advisory council and an economic planning council were set up. In 1978, however, the military council forced Acheampong to resign, giving way to General Frederick W. Akuffo. Akuffo ruled for less than a year before he was overthrown by Flight Lieutenant Jerry John Rawlings. Rawlings had both Acheampong and Akuffo executed for corruption. Rawlings also arrested and executed a number of other prominent military officers on charges of compromising the image of the Ghana armed forces. In September 1979, just months after seizing power, Rawlings stepped down in favor of an elected civilian president, Hilla Limann. When economic conditions worsened, however, Limann was deposed in a second coup led by Rawlings, on December 31, 1981.

Enjoying the support of workers and the poor, Rawlings injected a populist, revolutionary spirit into Ghanaian politics. The economy went through a severe decline in the early 1980s, leading hundreds of thousands of people to leave the country, most migrating to Nigeria. In 1983 the Nigerian government forced 1 million Ghanaians to return to their home country. In the same year, Rawlings abandoned his more radical economic strategies and negotiated a structural adjustment plan with the IMF. As the economy recovered, Rawlings moved toward democratic reforms as well. A new multiparty constitution was adopted by public referendum in 1992, and Rawlings was elected president.

In the 1990s many foreign observers praised Ghana for its increasingly open democracy. While visiting the country in 1998, U.S. president Bill Clinton recognized Ghana as a leader in a “new African renaissance.” Rawlings was reelected president in 1996. Limited to two terms by the 1992 constitution, he did not participate in the December 2000 elections, which marked the ascendancy of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP). The NPP edged Rawlings’ party in legislative elections, and NPP candidate John Kufuor defeated Rawlings’ vice president in the vote for president. Kufuor was sworn in as president in January 2001, the first time since Ghana’s independence that power changed hands peacefully and democratically. Kufuor was reelected in December 2004.