Page 90 - Afrika Must Unite

BRINGING UNITY IN GHANA 75

opposition can only criticize in a rather woolly way, saying, in
effect, that they would do the same things, only better and more
honestly.1

Unfortunately, the fundamental difference over the relative
power of the centre and the regions went deeper than The
Economist's passing reference to it would suggest. It was the core
of dissension between the Government and the opposition. It
involved the whole question of our continuance as a unitary
state exercising the democratic principle of majority rule. The
opposition was employing the lever given to it by the constitu­
tionally entrenched clauses enthroning the special position of
Ashanti, to force by disruptive measures the secession of the
region. •
Here was the root cause of the bitter feuding that had gripped
our beloved country on the eve of independence and continued
to m ar and harass our days of freedom. The N.L.M . had based
its support on the Asantehene and other autocratic chiefs
anxious to retain the special privileges and powers which the
British colonial practice of Indirect Rule had conferred upon
them. Their confidence in the success of their coercive methods
was sustained by the willing allies they found among imperialist
groups. It has been the unfortunate experience in all colonial
countries where the national awakening has crystallized into a
popular movement seeking the fundam ental democratic right
to the rule of the majority, that vested interests have come to the
aid of minority separatist groups.
These governments have often shown a touching concern for
the rights of these minorities. In fact, their concern has in some
cases been so great that it has overlooked entirely the rights of
the majority. Examples of this attitude may be seen in the
exercise of apartheid in South Africa and the enforcement, for
many years, of the Central African Federation against the
wishes of the Africans of Northern and Southern Rhodesia and
Nyasaland. It was the operative principle in Kenya, which sup­
ported the supremacy of the European minority over the African
majority and was implicit in the view that the rights of that alien
1 The Economist, 16 November 1957.