I apologize for the pace (or lack thereof) of posts.  We've just had a jam-packed itinerary for this trip and when we leave for the day, we leave for the day...   There hasn't been a lot of time to write anything, but as I find time, I will post some of the things dancing around in my mind that I'd like to share.

So this day for me, is Osagyefo Day -- this is something that I was hoping we'd get more info on during the trip.  So, I'll just start this post out with the following image:

This post is about Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the first Prime Minister of Ghana.

So this I was surprised that we were going to the Memorial Park and Museum of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah - pleasantly surprised, I might add.  While in college I did a little bit of research on the man known as Osagyefo ("Redeemer") , but if I'm being honest, I found very little information on the man in the United States.

For those who don't know, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah was a politician that most of the world doesn't know about.  He, like many others, set out a plan to free the Gold Coast from British colonial rule and lay out a plan to free all of Africa from colonial rule of European nations. 

He was able to free Gold Coast from British rule and establish Ghana as an "independent" country in Africa.  I'll explain why I put quotes around "independent" shortly.  During the establishment of Ghana, Osagyefo's next plan was to convert Ghana to a communist/socialist nation, this is when things started to change for Osagyefo.

In America, we hear the words "communism" or "socialism" and they bring up certain connotations for us without understanding the "why" behind a country's desire for this route.  What we don't understand in the United States is that countries like Ghana, and other African nations, wanted to become communist/socialist nations in order to nationalize their natural resources -- to give the country true ownership over those resources as a means of preventing colonial nations from taking "ownership" of them through means used in the business world. 

For a country like Ghana, rich in gold (hence the name Gold Coast), oil and other natural resources, nationalizing the country's resources is the only real way to get completely out from under the thumb of colonial rule. 

For Osagyefo, once it become public knowledge that this was his plan, to wrestle control of Ghana away from European nations, through change in how the country was governed, and moving the country to a one-party nation and giving himself designation of "president for life", his government was overthrown while he went for a trip to Cuba.

When we hear this story it makes him sound like he was this awful person, but in actuality, he wasn't.  This man led one of the largest periods of growth in the country with banks, bridges, hydro-power, dams, etc.  Conveniently, a lot of this growth stopped when he was deposed, and it stopped for DECADES.

It was Dr. Nkrumah's goal to bring stability and autonomy (one-Africa or Pan African policy) to the world where African nations could own their own lands and resources and leverage them to help all African nations grow financially.

There has been evidence that proves that the CIA was involved in the overthrow of Osagyefo's government as well as them working to destabilize Ghana and other nations.  More information can be found in Susan Willam's brilliant book, White Malice - The CIA and the Covert Recolonization of Africa.

I don't intend for this post to be a political statement, but just wanted to share some backdrop on who the man was.

Anyway, the country reveres what this man attempted to do to free and unify the continent of Africa so they celebrate him with a memorial park and have students visit the memorial every year to teach the history of the man that is so often forgotten in parts of Africa and the rest of the world.  

We were able to tour this memorial park and learn more about the man.  Some photos here for you...

Here are some of my favorites...

My personal favorite part of this place is the following statue because it symbolizes something that I personally live by, and that is to always move forward and focus on moving forward - leaving the past in the past but leveraging it to continue moving forward, always...

He was a brilliant man, politician, strategist and focused on moving the country forward, of which we are seeing today, finally...

So for the quotes around independent, those are there to basically say that Africa's natural resources and internal growth are still controlled by western nations...