Ghana’s first President Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah had wanted to industrialize the nation within a generation and everything was on course until some disgruntled Ghanaian soldiers with the help of the CIA staged a coup on February 24, 1966, to oust him.
There was jubilation in the country after the coup and Nkrumah reportedly wept while in Hanoi on a peace mission in Asia. All literature and anything that reminds Ghanaians of Nkrumah was destroyed to wipe off his legacy from the face of the earth,
Even his death in Bucharest, Romania, after being forced into exile in Guinea for six years, exactly 48 years ago today on April 27, 1972, is not commemorated by the country.
His death far away from his birthplace of Nkroful at the age of 62 was announced by President Sekou Toure of Guinea, one of his closest friends and co-president of the country that offered him a safe-haven.
Three videos dug up from the archives by GhanaWeb show the three funerals of Osagyefo in Guinea on May 1, 1972, Accra and Nkroful in July 1972, the latter being his hometown where he was buried the second time after his body was exhumed in Conakry.
His body was returned to Ghana on July 7, 1972, from Guinea following a long diplomatic tussle. His first funeral in Conakry saw several African heads of state; five members of the Colonel I. K. Acheampong-led National Redemption Council that overthrew the democratically-elected Progress Party (PP) government of Dr. K. A. Busia; and representatives of 25 other countries paying their last tributes.
Also captured in the footage is his wife, Fathia Nkrumah, clad in black attire and in a solemn mood.
Back in Ghana, the military government had declared May 19 as a national day of mourning and public holiday to mark the death of Nkrumah. A non-denominational service was held at the State House without the body.
After a successful negotiation to bring the body of the Co-president of Guinea to be buried in his hometown, a funeral service was again held at the forecourt of the State House and his body was laid in state for Ghanaians to pay their last respects.
He was then flown to Nkroful where he was buried for the second time. On July 1, 1992, Nkrumah’s body was exhumed again and reburied at a mausoleum in Accra.
This information and footages are not aired on television and cannot be found in Ghana’s history books as at the time of writing this story.
Read about the aftermath of the death of Ghana’s first president Kwame Nkrumah
By Ismail Akwei for Face2Face Africa
"… No talking drum announced this tragedy to his own people in mournful tones. No gong-gong summoned any familiar face to his side. No dirges recounted a litany to his praise. No linguist was present to recite any of his numerous appellations in eloquent and ornate language. Ironically, “Osagyefo,” “Kwame Atoapem,” “Show Boy” lay cold and still in a lonely infirmary among a strange people he did not know. His own people had rejected him and put a price on his head as a common criminal 10. Ghana, the land which he risked everything to free from bondage, had stabbed a deadly wound in his heart. Like the stab of Brutus to Caesar, it was “the most unkindest cut of all”; for as we knew Brutus to be Caesar’s angel, so was Ghana dearest to Nkrumah’s heart. And like Caesar, struggling in excruciating pain till he fell beneath the statue of Pompey, so did Nkrumah struggle alone in the agony of death, till he gave up his weary soul to its Maker in the Bucharest infirmary. “And what a fall was there there, my countrymen, that deny you and I and all.” Ghana and Africa fell."
These were the words of Accra’s Weekly Spectator journalist Kwabena Kissi in an article titled: “Nkrumah, the Leader We Never Understood.”
The article was published following the death of Ghana’s deposed leader, 62-year-old Kwame Nkrumah, on April 27, 1972, in a hospital in Bucharest, Romania, where he was undergoing medical treatment since August 1971.
By Ismail Akwei for Face2Face Africa
"… No talking drum announced this tragedy to his own people in mournful tones. No gong-gong summoned any familiar face to his side. No dirges recounted a litany to his praise. No linguist was present to recite any of his numerous appellations in eloquent and ornate language. Ironically, “Osagyefo,” “Kwame Atoapem,” “Show Boy” lay cold and still in a lonely infirmary among a strange people he did not know. His own people had rejected him and put a price on his head as a common criminal 10. Ghana, the land which he risked everything to free from bondage, had stabbed a deadly wound in his heart. Like the stab of Brutus to Caesar, it was “the most unkindest cut of all”; for as we knew Brutus to be Caesar’s angel, so was Ghana dearest to Nkrumah’s heart. And like Caesar, struggling in excruciating pain till he fell beneath the statue of Pompey, so did Nkrumah struggle alone in the agony of death, till he gave up his weary soul to its Maker in the Bucharest infirmary. “And what a fall was there there, my countrymen, that deny you and I and all.” Ghana and Africa fell."
These were the words of Accra’s Weekly Spectator journalist Kwabena Kissi in an article titled: “Nkrumah, the Leader We Never Understood.”
The article was published following the death of Ghana’s deposed leader, 62-year-old Kwame Nkrumah, on April 27, 1972, in a hospital in Bucharest, Romania, where he was undergoing medical treatment since August 1971.
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