As the Week Opens in Accra: What a Time on the "West Coast"!

In my experience, it seems like it is the cognoscenti of the US who like to call the West African sub-region the "West Coast", as if in an attempt to tease out the nostalgia of living in the States.

To cut a long story short, my mind is sure in Ghana, but my heart is...all over the West Coast;-) There are many wonderful facets of West Africa I discovered in the past frenetic eight days which I would not trade for anything.

There's the ability to connect seamlessly with mobile networks like MTN in Cote d'ivoire with my Ghana chip, but not so easily in Nigeria. Working with Zain when we touched down for the plane to re-fuel in Burkina, but how within an hour, Zain was off to be replaced by ORANGE.

Then there's the food; the greenery; the dryness; the reality of being able to get-up-and-go to any of the West African countries with ease, provided you have enough money on you...and the language! Ghana and Nigeria better wake up to the reality of a mostly-francophone West Africa...

Good to be back home, though!

Taxi Tales: Of Demolition Men...

It began yesterday with what would prove to be a discerning afternoon, replete with dramatic and cascading scenes of pockets of crowds congregating in clusters of emotion, awe, surprise and resignation as men fron Accra Metropolitan Assembly, in collaboration with Zoom Lion--all clad in reflective attire--started demolishing structures, kiosks and whatnot.

All this was happening in a messy atmosphere of smoke, emanating from the furious fire of burning wood and metal.

It truly was a sight to behold.

The helplessness of those whose kiosks were being destroyed was palpable. The glimmer of hope in their eyes for a daily income must have died there and then.

But this was to be expected--for in the past few weeks, the AMA has undertaken a clean-up exercise of Accra--to rid the capital of filth before 15 countries descend into the country in January 2008 for the Cup of African Nations, to be hosted in Ghana.

Either way, the taxi driver who brought me back to the office was ambivalent. He felt that Ghanaians are too stubborn for their own good and that, whilst the situation was sad, the "squatters" had been informed as recently as a six months to a year ago.

"We Ghanaians, we are too stubborn!" he added as he fropped me off, taking my fee.

Could't agree more!!

As the Week Opens in Accra: Why ECOWAS Citizens Lost Their Lives in Ghana (1)

My absence from here was due in part to a funeral I had to attend in my maternal grandmother's home town. Now, this town is some 1.5 hours away from the capital by road, and forms part of what has now become known as the Trans West African Highway Network, supposed to connect some of the West African countries together

[- Damane (Liberia border) 26 km in Côte d’Ivoire ;

- Bloloquin-Toulepleu-(Liberia border) 64 km - Côte d’Ivoire

- Ganta-Tappita-Douanes Tobli-Blay (Côte d’Ivoire border): 15 km in Liberia ;

- Bandajuma-Zimmi-Mru Bridge (Liberia border) : 97 km, in Sierra Leone ;

- Freetown-Pamelap (Guinea border : 126 km, in Sierra Leone;

- Boke (Guinea) - Quebo (Guinea Bissau) : 206 km

- Akatsi/Dzodze (Togo border): 31 km in Ghana ;

- Noepe-Hilla Condji (Benin border) : 80 km, in Togo. ]

In effect, the so-called Trans-West African Highway Network has been comprehensively completed since last week, prompting joys that the ECOWAS link-up is becoming more of a reality.

Sadly, it's coming at a cost, as exemplified by last Thursday's eerie accident that involved two articulators travelling at top speed in opposite directions; the helping of Ghanaian motorists of passengers of an overturned bus (comprising West Africans from Cote d' Ivoire, Liberia, Benin, Nigeria and Togo) resulting in their deaths as the second articulator hit them at top speed (after having lost control). Altogether, seven vehicles were involved in the very sad loss of lives that claimed 40 people.

The road on which this happened goes to one of Ghana's premier tourist regions--the Central Region, where there is much more greenery than in the capital of Accra.

The roads are so good and so speed-inducing it's not funny. Regrettably, badly-educated and opportunistic (not to mention tired) articulator truck drivers take advantage of these good roads and act as death merchants.

To remind Ghanaian motorists of the importance of preserving lives, my favourite network, Ghana's mobile network--Onetouch--has erected billboards throughout the highway that spans several kilometres, reminding drivers not just they can connect to ONETOUCH in the area they have passed, but that "life is precious, drive with care".

A publicity stunt, notwithstanding, it's important to read that as you cruise from one region to the next.

(May those West Africans who lost their lives, as well as those Ghanaians who stopped to help them, ending up killed, rest in perfect peace)