On March 6, 1957, Nkrumah, the newly elected Prime Minister of Ghana, declared, “the independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is linked up with the total liberation of Africa.” That night Ghana was celebrating independence from its former European colonizer, Britain. It was the first African country south of the Sahara to win its independence. This week coincides with his birthday, Nkrumah was born on September 21, 1909.
Three years after independence, Nkrumah had promoted himself to President. It was a post he held until 1966 when his enemies in the army overthrew him (as Euro-American powers looked the other way). In Ghana, his ideas and memory were largely marginalized in the 1970s as its successive governments made a turn to the right. He died in Romania in 1972 following exile in Sekou Toure’s Guinea. Today, Nkrumah is making a comeback, and it is the impact of his legacy on today’s generation that we will explore on this week’s show.
