President Nana Akufo-Addo with Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari
Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari has showered plaudits on Ghana—a country he said “is the first, true African democracy.”
The Nigerian strongman’s social media tweet, coming against the backdrop of the recent statement from the Information Minister about the arrest of persons suspected to be planning a coup, could be a subtle show of solidarity with his Ghanaian counterpart and the people of this country.
Ghanaians can count on the unflinching support and friendship of Nigeria—the retired General and now President assured his Ghanaian counterpart.
“We in Nigeria hold out—as always—our hands in support and friendship to our brothers and sisters in Ghana,” he said.
The Nigerian President flaunted Ghana’s pedigree in the tweet when he stated how the country is held in the highest esteem especially pointing at its record of being the first post-colonial country in Africa to gain independence, and as he posted “the first African country to hold multi-party elections by universal suffrage. Ghana is the first, true African democracy.”
The carefully crafted tweet touched on the roles of the two countries in the cause of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), not forgetting the partnership they have forged since the establishment of the bloc.
President Buhari did not forget to refer to the progress the two countries have chalked up in the fight against corruption, socio-economic canker afflicting both of them. The progress, he said, is attested to by the recent Transparency International and Afro Barometer’s Africa Index “which have recorded exceptional advances in fighting corruption.”
Still on corruption, President Buhari explained how fighting it is fraught with challenges because, as he observed, such duels are against powerful and corrupt vested interests. Such interests, he noted, would sometimes seek to “push back” because of the success in the fight against them. He embellished his point with the saying that “if you fight corruption, corruption will fight back.”
Ghana and Nigeria, as President Buhari noted in his tweet, are leading pillars in ECOWAS where their roles have been phenomenal as evidenced in the deployment of troops to Liberia during that country’s civil war.
The volume of trade between them—formal and informal— is also heavy.
Although there have been occasional misunderstandings between the two countries, these have mostly been outside diplomacy.
The long-standing bond of friendship between them has resulted in one of the widely spoken languages in Nigeria—Hausa—gaining a foothold in Ghana, where today it is a recognized local tongue coming next after English and Akan.
President Buhari was schooled with Hausa like the late Alhaji Ibrahim Coomasie—a former IGP of Nigeria whose ancestors migrated to the then Gold Coast and had already been finely assimilated through intermarriages.
By A.R. Gomda