Whosoever mooted the idea of a 24-Hour Economy for Mr. John Mahama to propagate has done him a very great disservice. The man himself does not know what a 24-hour economy is, not to talk of his followers who rumble and beat about the bush on the topic. Even Professors who are supposed to know better are making a mess of themselves when they try to define the ill-conceived programme.
All what they can tell us is to go to overseas countries and see how a 24-hour economy works. Me, buy a plane ticket, fly to an overseas country to see how a 24-hour economy works when I saw one in this country about sixty years ago when even the mother Sammy Gyamfi, the Communication Director of the NDC was not born? Akai! Politics have made some professors to suffer from infantile disorders. Sad indeed.
Yes, Ghana used to practice a 24-hour economy but that dream was killed by Mr. Rawlings and his (P)NDC destructive regime. Mr. Mahama was always quick to tell Ghanaians when he was contesting Nana Akufo Addo in 2012 that he was the lucky young Ghanaian President who was born after Ghana attained independence and that Nana Addo was an old man who was not fit to rule. Maybe that is the reason why he did not see 24-hour economy in those glorious days. Dr. Kwame Nkrumah did not proclaim his 24-hour economy with empty slogans like the way Mr. Mahama is disturbing our ears.
Like the One District One Factory programme introduced by the Nana Addo-led administration, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah started with industrialisation. In Takoradi alone, we had, the Paper Convention Company, producing toilets rolls; the Cocoa Factory, producing Cocoa Powder, Cocoa butter among others; the Takoradi Veneer Company, producing plywood; the Takoradi Cement Works; the Takoradi Flour Mills; The Chinese Factory, producing corrugated iron sheets; cooking utensils etc.; the Pioneer Tobacco Company (PTC), producing various types of cigarettes like Embassy, 555, King Size, Tusker for Men etc.
Imagine one town with so many factories! In the same Western Region, we had the Samreboi Plywood Factory and the Prestea Gold Mines. We also had the Tarkwa Bonsa Tyre Factory; Tarkwa Mines; the Aboso Glass Factory and the Rubber Plantation near Tarkwa to feed the Bonsa Tyre Company; Awaso Bauxite Company etc.
All these among others were working 24 hours daily. So you see, in those days, Takoradi was a sleepless town. The Takoradi Harbour worked 24 hours as labourers carried cocoa beans from the warehouses to the ships docked at the wharf, and stevedores worked all day and night to load logs and other bulky goods on board the ships. Liner Agency was working day and night to make sure ships docked to carry timber logs dumped on the sea are loaded on board as well as sawn timber for export.
As for beer bars, apketashie bars, food sellers, “swinging Safari” guys and prostitutes, there was no time to rest. Even when Dr. Kwame Nkrumah was overthrown, successive governments like Acheampong’s SMC, Busia ’s Progress Party, Dr. Hilla Limann’s PNP continued until “Otofo” JJ Rawlings came storming with his mad soldiers to turn the apple cart upside down. In fact, Takoradi was a town of sleepless workers who worked on shift basis. Tarkwa was the same. That was why we used to say The Best Comes From The West. Where was Mr. John Mahama then?
The Central Region had her fair share of the factories like the Saltpond Ceramics, the Komenda Sugar Factory and the Cape Coast Citrus Factory. Even producers of molasses, the byproduct of discarded sugar cane squeezed by machines in the Komenda Sugar Factory worked day and night to meet the demands of customers who used the molasses to distill apketashie. Do you know another name of apketashie is Mola?
As for Greater Accra Region where the Osagyefo built the Tema Harbour, I will not have space here to mention the numerous factories working 24 hours a day. In the Ashanti Region, we had the Kumasi Brewery, the GIHOC Shoe Factory and many more, working 24 hours. In the Brong Ahafo Region, we had the Mim Sawmill, producing sawn timber for export, the Scanstile Furniture Company, producing furniture for home consumption and export.
There was also the Wenchi Tomato Factory, producing tomato puree, pepper puree, canned snails, canned palmnut soup, canned garden eggs and even canned mushrooms. At Nkoranza we had the BasteFiber Company, producing cocoa sacks for cocoa farmers. We also had the Kade Match Factory, the Akosombo Textiles and the Juapong Textiles. Oh! Good old days, where have thou flown to?
In the Northern Region, we had the Bolgatanga Meat Factory, producing the Volta Corn Beef and tanned leather for export. There was also the Pwalugu Tomato Factory and of course the almighty Tiger Pito Factory. All these factories were operating 24 hours.
When Egya Sebo, the Founder of the NDC usurped power, he sold more than three hundred factories including those mentioned above. As to who bought them, only the ghost of Rawlings can tell. In fact, Rawlings and his (P)NDC sold everything including the great Black Star Line, the first shipping line in West Africa which could boast of twenty cargo ships, carrying our cocoa beans and timber as well as bulky goods abroad and brought back our imports.
These nation wreckers abandoned state hotels like Atlantic Hotel in Takoradi; Ambassador Hotel in Accra; Continental Hotel in Accra; Star Hotel in Kumasi; the mighty Meridian Hotel in Tema, and all the Catering Guest Houses in all the Regional Capitals were sold to their cronies who could not manage them and left them to rot. All these were working 24 hours.
If by the “grace” of Ndewura Jakpa, the slave trader who was the Founder of Gonjaland, John Mahama comes to power to enslave us again, where and when will he start his 24-hour economy project? How many factories did Mahama build for the eight years that he ruled this country for him to talk of a 24-Hour economy? Having sold all the factories built by Dr. Kwame Nkrumah and others, where will the workers of Mahama 24-Hour economy workers get job to do?
Is he going to rely on Akufo-Addo’s One District One Factory or Agenda 111 Hospitals? He will have only four years to rule and it will take him not less than six months to assemble his ministers for vetting and approval, appoint Board Members and “adjust” his presidential seat. By the third year into his regime, he will come face to face with another election year which he will not be qualified to run as the Constitution dictates.
Is he, therefore, going to take two and half years to import elephants and lions from China and fence the forests for the 24-hour economy to start as the defenders of the 24-Hour economy apparatchiks are telling us? In fact, is he going to start right away to build hatcheries and piggeries to supply chicks and piglets to Ghanaians to rear as hepromised?
Ah, maybe he will import the piglets from Papua New Guinea and day old chicks from Burkina Faso where our Guinea Fowls have sojourned in a way of batter. After all, the guinea fowls belong to Ghanaians so we have the right to exchange them for the promised chicks for our poor farmers to rear here in Ghana. Captain Ibrahim Traore, the President of Burkina Faso should be ready for the batter system else he will meet us at The Hague.
Those who are defending the 24-Hour economy should look through the mirror and see how a foolish man looks like after reading this piece. Surely, you will never see my face in your mirror. Full stop!!!
By Eric Bawah