Ghana : end of an illusion

For if you think that you can manage a country without letting the people interfere, if you think that the people upset the game by their mere presence, whether they slow it down or whether by their natural ignorance they sabotage it, then you must have no hesitation: you must keep the people out. —Frantz Fanon Within twenty-four hours the coup was over. It began at 5:00 A.M. when 20 tanks, under joint military and police command, surrounded Flagstaff House, the triple-walled residence of Dr. Nkrumah. By 10:00 A.M., members of Dr. Nkrumah's Soviet-led security guard were beginning to surrender. By 6:00 P.M., Radio Ghana was able to broadcast: After Ghana's accession to independence, a new class was formed whose principal occupation consisted in emptying the Treasury and perpetrating crimes of all kinds under the pretext of creating a socialist state. Today Kwame Nkrumah and this new class have ceased to exist.This article can also be found at the Monthly Review website, where most recent articles are published in full.Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the Monthly Review website.