Page 129 - Afrika Must Unite

i i 4 AFRICA MUST UNITE
break the hold which the monopoly interests, including foreign
shippers, have upon our trade. The revenue that goes abroad
every year merely in the shipment of our cocoa runs into several
millions sterling. W ithout shipping of our own, we are placed at
the mercy of the foreign shipping lines, who could hold us to
ransom, as they have in the past, at any time they wished. W ith
our own shipping we shall become independent of external
maritime agencies. We shall bring revenue to our own coffers,
and once more make a fine addition to our skills and experience.
In connection wdth our communication projects, we have
organized a nautical training school and a flying school which are
designed to supply us with sufficient trained personnel to man
and officer our ships and aircraft. Training is planned to proceed
in stages so as to afford an annual output of men for immediate
absorption into the shipping and flying services.
All industries of any major economic significance require, as a
basic facility, a large and reliable source of power. In fact, the
industrialization of Britain, America, Canada, Russia, and other
countries too, emerged as a result of the discovery of new sources
of energy. Newer nations, like our own, which are determined to
catch up, must have a plentiful supply of electricity if they are to
achieve any large-scale industrial advance. This, basically, was
the justification for the Volta River Project.
This project, and the extension of the port and harbour at
Tem a, will have a massive effect on our national economy and
enlarge its development. The Volta River scheme involves the
production of hydro-electrical power by damming the river and
applying the great volume of resultant cheap power to convert
our bauxite resources into aluminium and to provide electri­
fication for the nation’s other industries. The Volta is our
largest river, and we have enough bauxite to feed an aluminium
smelter with a capacity of 200,000 tons. As originally conceived,
the project called for raising the level of the water through the
erection of a single high dam with a power station below to
harness the energy released by the drop and convert it into
electricity. Almost its whole output was to be devoted to the
working of a smelter for rolling bauxite into aluminium sheets.
This and the estimated cost of £300 million sterling dimmed the
attractiveness of the project.