African Traditional Ideas Can Help Rehabilitate Ghana’s Environmental Consciousness and Responsibility

"At a time that environmentalists and conservationists are developing narratives for advocacy campaigns to save these natural resources, the government of Ghana overtly puts additional log in the flaming pyre—the construction of the multi million-dollar Pokuase interchange which may deal the river the last blow".

"Tswa Omanye!", the Asafoatse exclaimed, as the ground swallowed the last pint of water he released from the container. "Ehi eha wɔ", we replied, to conclude the opening prayer before the meeting started. The pouring of libation is not alien to Ghanaian tradition and so the call on the Supreme Being to guide and influence the deliberations in the early morning was expected.

My entire Monday evening the previous day was spent figuring out the line of questions to pose to the high profile elder of Asere Clan I’d be engaging the next morning. The Asafoatse of the Pokuase area had arranged a meeting for Tuesday morning so I can discuss the history behind the Gua Koo reserve and the Sunkwa River in Pokuase, as part of my documentary on frontline communities, a collaborative project with the Cambridge Climate Frontline Programme.

When the elder took the baton after the libation, my questions, numbering up to 16 were rendered redundant. I tucked the sheets beneath my note pad unnoticed, readied my pen and listened to him with rapturous attention. The old man distilled the historical antecedents of the Ga people with unrehearsed articulation. His flair for story telling in eloquent Ga language kneaded with occasional stupendous English expressions is probably the rubber stamp on his growing credentials as an authority on Ga history, and the scribe for the Asere Clan. The latter has 45 towns and villages under it with the headquarters as Ayawaso (original pronunciation: Ayi-Wa-So meaning ‘Ayi stopped on Thursday’).

The Gua Koo (Gua Forest) from which Sunkwa flows dates centuries ago. Gua is the name of a principal god of the Ga people who followed them to Ayawaso from ancient Mizraim (present day Egypt).  Gua is a thunder and lightning deity who is a fighter, protector and provider for the needy. According to the elder, Gua was instrumental to the repair and sustenance of the people after the Akwamus destroyed Ayawaso in the 17th Century.  The forest provided food, water, shelter, medicinal plants and fiber for clothing, that Ayawaso harnessed to crawl back to health. That Gua is a provider and fighter even in modern day Pokuase is a fact—residents testified in the course of my interviews that while nearby water bodies will dry during drought, Sunkwa will continue to flow to serve the town and its surroundings.

The Gua forest reserve at Pokuase stretches from ACP junction eastwards from Achimota

In the wake of massive housing construction and pollution in the areas around the forest, the most significant reason for the survival of the forest and the river is the annual traditional rituals and religious rites performed in reverence and gratitude to Gua. Dispense with the sacred and see the profaned and wanton decimation of Gua and Sunkwa thriving dastardly in broad day Pokuase. At a time that environmentalists and conservationists are developing narratives for advocacy campaigns to save these natural resources, the government of Ghana overtly puts additional log in the flaming pyre—the construction of the multi million-dollar Pokuase interchange which may deal the river the last blow if the Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA) is not thoroughly scrutinized. 

The Sunkwa has its source in the Gua Koo

What is worth highlighting though is the fact that African traditional ideas deserve a seat in the coliseum of national level environmental engagements and global climate talks. While Western anthropocentric thought is the root of the global environmental crisis, African primal tradition is a reservoir of proven conservation ideas.  Indeed, Al Gore in his writings has called out astute Western thinker Francis Bacon whose 16^th Century philosophical views on human progress still influence civilization’s stranglehold on the environment unalterably. Meanwhile, René Descartes’ definition of a particle when extrapolated within an ecological framework ought to be further interrogated for consistency and environmental sustainability.

With the level of environmental degradation in Ghana and the dreadful impacts of climate change which combined recently to intensify calls for water rationing in Ghana by the Ghana Water Company, it should be common sense for echelons of government, civil society and private partners to plump for African traditional conservation ideas to safeguard resources and national treasures like Gua Koo and Sunkwa. With respect to these two, we are about to cross the Rubicon.

My Cambridge Climate Frontline Diary: Discovering Pokuase

"With the collaboration from Cambridge, I am hoping to engage frontline communities in Ghana and parts of Africa facing the impacts of climate change, and highlight African traditional conservational ideas within the communities that protect the environment and promote resilience".

I paced languidly across the street up the hill out of hunger. It was too early for breakfast when I left home so my muscles were probably wringing every grain of glycogen for endurance. I looked totally disinterested in surrounding activities—the boring traffic jam on the Achimota-Pokuase stretch that can easily put many a motorist to sleep, and of course, the showdown involving  troskis  at the ACP bus stop cluttering for passengers which is a frequent chaos.

My attention was however stolen from approximately 50 meters away; a long and powerful drilling equipment, manned by some Chinese people crushed the top soil besides the Sunkwa River. Leaving rock debris in its wake, the heavy duty machine grubbed into the bedrock and pulled up rock samples to the surface. Its operators looked on appeased at its strength and efficiency. I ogled, as the noise from the machine commensurate with its mammoth horse power pummeled my ear drums. It was my third time in Pokuase to meet my contact person called Jack.

After he welcomed me, I quizzed, “what are they doing with the machine?” He replied, “because of the highway under construction, the engineers want to know if the land is strong enough to hold the overpass”. My visit had coincided with construction work for the $84m three tier Pokuase Interchange jointly funded by the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the Government of Ghana (GoG) to be completed in April 2020. That Chinese workforce and tech are heavily involved in this project is an overwhelming glimpse of Beijing's ambitious 'Made in China 2025' programme that is heavily targeted by the Trump-led US administration, in what has now morphed into a Sino-US trade war.

Artistic impression of the Pokuase Interchange. Credit: Citi Newsroom

My interest in Pokuase however is two-fold; the Gua Koo forest reserve, a sacred groove that stretches eastwards towards Pokuase township before ACP junction, and the Sunkwa River which flows from the forest and serves the community and its environs. While the forest is under imminent threat, the destruction of the water body is looming.  The unique and striking story of conservation behind the forest and the river is worth telling and listening.  I am taking on this project as part of my partnership with the Cambridge Calimate Frontline Programme (CCFP) based in the University of Cambridge in the UK.

With the collaboration from Cambridge, I am hoping to engage frontline communities in Ghana and parts of Africa facing the impacts of climate change, and highlight African traditional conservation ideas within the communities that protect the environment and promote resilience.  I am hoping to communicate conservation ideas rooted in African culture and value systems that are alien to Western thought. 

I have spent the past 2 months working with a dedicated team of close friends and environmentalists to sample which community to engage and what story to tell first. With a long list of amazing places with incredible stories to tell, I shudder to say that Gua Koo and Sunkwa are just a fraction of undocumented cases. I will be keeping a diary of this journey and I hope that you will share the story as it is told.

My meeting with Jack today was successful. He led me to meet the Asafoatse of the area whose family is the custodian of Gua Koo. This will be followed by another meeting with the elders before our team can finally be granted access to conduct interviews and do a video recording. The broad grin of excitement worn on my face out of a successful meeting today was so real,  like the whiffs of frying oil that greeted my nostrils with a tinge of déjà vu as I exited my host’s compound. Ah! The woman is frying my favorite spring rolls here!

17/07/2018

The Story Behind the 'Three Forgotten Villages'

Most of you reading this post know me as an environmentalist who is also very passionate about renewable energy. In the past 2-3 years, I have focused my work in areas that are ignored by majority of players in the energy sector— off-grid communities in rural centers and villages. My convictions are: first, solar lighting solutions make more socio-economic sense in villages than bulk grid infrastructure, and second, the social capital and human potential in rural areas are so vast to be ignored. I have therefore made efforts to visit as many villages as possible to learn about what can work there with solar.

A couple of months ago, some friends reached out to me about visiting some villages they thought needed help with solar lighting. After months of connecting with a contact on the ground, I made the trip with 2 colleagues— Perk Pomeyie of our startup company Solar People and Afi Antonio, founder of our social action project Solar4Girls, supported by friends and partner Support A Vision Ghana.

From Left: Gideon, Afi and Perk

We embarked on an adventurous trip with three objectives: first, connect with the local school there, and provide solar lamps to the 20 Junior High School (JHS) pupils who are preparing for their Basic Education Certificate Examination (B.E.C.E) in 2018. Second, build a relationship with the people in the community, and third, assess the needs and potential of the community, and reach out to people in our network for additional support in the sectors of education, energy, health, etc. 

On the dawn of Friday October 20, the journey to the ‘three forgotten villages’—Tsremanti Dornguanor, Tsremanti Yoyim and Besease Dornguanor of the Yilo Krobo District of the Easter Region began.

A shot of Tsremanti Dornguanor

We traveled from Accra through Akropong-Akuapem to Nkurakan where we picked a taxi to Akpamu junction. 

Since the villages do not have a motorable path from here, we began a 40 minutes walk on foot through the valley to Tsremanti Dorguanor, also known as the valley village. The other option is an hour and half journey also on foot through the forest from Koforidua Pipeline; we used this route after our visit when returning 

from the village.

In the middle of the forest descending the hills to the 'valley village'.

Every holistic development is transformational, integral and sustainable, and requires the practitioner to assess the potential of the community in order to design a response. Below are our findings after an assessment of Tsremanti Dornguanor:

Leadership

The village has a chief and a linguist with a group of elders who see to the welfare of the community. We also met the Unit Committee members of the village. What impressed us most was the introduction of the member in charge of youth development.

Electricity/Energy

This was the main reason we went to the village. The community has no electricity and children rely on traditional lanterns and torchlights to study at night. Not only does this impede their education, children and adults also risk bites from poisonous snakes and other reptiles at night.

We provided solar lamps to pupils with support from friends

Water

The only source of water in the village is a stream, which links all the 3 villages. This is for both drinking and irrigation purpose.

Education

This is a big challenge in Tsremanti Dorguanor and the 2 sister villages. There are 2 classroom blocks; one is a makeshift structure and the other requires a facelift. The educational facilities and supplies for learning are inexistent or incredibly inadequate. Pupils are in dire need of uniforms, knapsacks and learning tools. But the biggest problem the local school faces is with teachers. The lack of electricity, portable water, motorable path, health post and mobile network, coupled with the lack of accommodation facilities for teachers make it difficult for them to live in the village.  Children therefore have to travel for 2 hours to Nkurakan during the weekend for extra classes. The performance of the local school in the BECE has been fairly good and access to electricity will improve it immensely.

The primary school classroom block at Tsremantin Dornguanor

In addition to this, because teachers have to walk for hours climbing and descending mountains every week to teach, they are not able to come to school the whole week. A teacher told me, “I do 2/5 or 3/5 because I get too tired walking for hours and escaping snakes just to teach and return to where I live”. I was lost about what 2/5 and 3/5 mean until he explained to mean 2 or 3 days out of 5 days in a week. Because of these challenges, there are no female teachers in the school.

Agriculture

This is the biggest potential in the village. The land is very fertile for vegetables such as cabbage and green pepper, for tubers such as cassava and cocoyam, and for cocoa. The number of cabbage farms we saw impressed us. The problem however is about access to markets for these produce. The lack of roads linking the village to urban centers present villagers with 2 options: children and women carrying produce and climbing the mountains to the nearest market which is 4 kilometers away or paying a fortune for vehicles to cart the produce to markets in Nkurakan or Koforidua.

The villages are noted for cabbage production 

The creation of road networks will transform education and also impact agriculture and energy. If families can access markets for their produce without excessive costs, they can save some money to afford solar for their children to study at night. The presence of lights can also be a motivation for teachers to stay for weekends and help pupils with extra lessons.

Health

All the villages have no health post. The nearest health post is about an hour away (Koforidua Zongo) where emergency cases are taken. Community members carry sick people on broken doors and walk through the forest for treatment. A small makeshift health post which will respond to emergencies such as snakebites and provide first aid will come in handy. We were however told that some community health nurses from Nkurakan visit the village occasionally for health outreaches.

Sports

The school has very good sportsmen and women in athletics and football. We were thrilled to meet one of the girls who doubles as the captain of the football team and 3000m women champion in the Yilo Krobo District for 4 consecutive years.

Most of the students in the JHS are good in sports

Conclusion

Our visit to Dornguanor was very successful. We had an amazing time with the school pupils and reached out to them with solar lamps. The experience was beautiful, and at the end we were fulfilled when departing. I hope this post will ignite your interest to know more about the ‘three forgotten villages’ and reach out to support them.

School children using the solar lamps

The journey from the village on foot through the Dornguanor forest

My Theological Journey: For Mission and Environmentalism

"Ignorance is the mother of all superstition, not devotion" - A.H. Strong

This year has already been a very eventful one for me, occasionally depressing yet assuring. No matter what life throws at you, sometimes if you are still fighting then it means you are gaining some grounds. Though am writing this in February, I believe 2017 has been my toughest year so far since my full adult life began. It is needless to sugar a pill and half; it's been a hectic first two months. But fighting while wounded on the battle field, I have still gained some grounds— my first book would be released next month, a vision I began nurturing 5 years ago.

Cover Design by Perk Pomeyie

But the best decision I believe I have made this year is to take 10months off active activism to study Theology. I chose to enroll in the Akrofi-Christaller Institute of Theology, Mission and Culture because they were offering an MA in Theology, Holistic Mission and Development, and I felt that was what I was looking for as a foundation for my long term interest in combining Environmentalism with Apologetics. It wasn't a tough decision to make considering I knew I had to build and develop myself to communicate my faith coherently to make my activism relevant. Moreover, I wanted an opportunity to think, and think justly and I found one within walls of the Institute.

Theology as you know in this part of the world and age, is easily dismissed as another ivory tower of academia—rigidly intellectual and tacitly anti-spiritual and dangerous to faith. So theology is often packaged neatly in a box and stored away somewhere safe, while spiritual reality is pursued as a daily endeavor. This thought and practice is equally erroneous. Study is a spiritual discipline—so theology both intellectuality and spirituality. Indeed God commands us to love Him with our minds in scripture (Luke 10:27) so combining heart and mind to think is according to his will. Maybe, that is why we don't send our best to theological schools today. Centuries ago, theology was described as the 'Queen of the Sciences' and only the best and most brilliant students pursued it. It was theologians who thought for the rest of society.

The Global South is now the centre of gravity of Christianity, Africa is a Christian heartland in the 21st Century and this is the time to respond to culturally rooted issues and questions of faith and how to live it out in society. We have already been dispossessed both in culture and heritage and there is a need for a valid knowledge of how the self-disclosure of God through His son Jesus Christ shapes our entire existence and influence in society towards justice for all of God's creation. Once a while, you bump into people who reject Christianity because they claim it's a religion passed on by colonial masters. This is invalid. In fact, there were Christians in Africa—leading apologists— for that matter between the 2nd and 3rd Centuries AD. That was before European Christendom as a matter of fact. That said, the Reformation was in the 16th Century, the Missionary Movement, 19th Century.

Tertullian (c. 160 to c. 225) an African lawyer had an enormous impact on Western Theology, a prolific author who produced an extensive corpus of Latin Literature. We can begin to re-think about how to respond to social issues of rights and justice when we gain a deeper understanding of the opportunity we have as African Christians in shaping global worldview as the Early Christians did.

Tertullian

We live in a society where injustice triumphs; perpetrated by the echelons of media, academia, judiciary, government, organized religion, politics, etc. But we have all looked on and watched the poor and voiceless and oppressed suffer and the environment decimated while we pursue our own prosperity and progress. This is in stark contrast to the Gospel. In fact, Jesus Christ came down on earth as a man to establish God's justice on earth. That is the Gospel—the Theology that challenges yours. 

In Luke 4, Jesus returned to the synagogue in Nazareth after being tempted by the devil. The book of Isaiah was handed to him and he read his mandate on earth (Isaiah 61). After that he closed the book and with everyone's gaze fixed on him, he declared, "today this scripture has been fulfilled in your ears". My theology is the Gospel— justice for God's creation. What is yours?

The Youth Meeting: The Future of the Commonwealth Through Our Lens

"This is why we collectively revere the RCS as a platform that young people can use to give relevance to the Commonwealth"

The 2016 International Meetings of the Royal Commonwealth Society (RCS) took place in London from October 3-7. The meetings were hosted by High Commissions of various member countries and brought together members from pan Commonwealth branches and networks to share experiences and plan for the future.

The Youth Meeting, held on the first two days to precede the Branch Meeting, in my personal opinion was the highlight of the meetings. 60% of the 2.3 billion total population of the Commonwealth is under 30 years of age. It is on the heels of this youth constituency and the power they wield in leadership, innovation and technology that the Commonwealth will thrive on in the coming years.

The youth acknowledged that the Commonwealth represents diversity of membership unparalleled even at the global stage— a unique cultural tapestry bound together by common values and aspirations. However, the youth perspective and outlook of the Commonwealth largely has been a network that has little or no relevance to younger generation, but rather a relic, significant to older individuals still romanticizing colonial events and their linkages in this modern era.

This is why we collectively revere the RCS as a platform that young people can use to give relevance to the Commonwealth.

The youth agreed at the meeting that they have a role to play in the current RCS structure. We will add youth perspectives to Commonwealth conversations, promote the RCS through our activities, initiatives and events, and offer skills and expertise to branches in our home countries. The Associate Fellows (AF) themselves believe that they are an asset to the RCS and agreed to serve as Commonwealth ambassadors to give the network visibility in their countries. We will do this by connecting to people who share common values with us, serve as role models and mentors for younger generations and build a network of leaders and professionals from diverse fields to influence national policies and shape global issues.

The RCS on the other hand was discussed to have a role and responsibility towards the youth. The organization is expected to help raise the profile of youth by providing the platform to promote their work and give visibility to their social action initiatives. It should also provide opportunities to Associate Fellows in training, capacity building and funding.

In going forward into the future, the Youth Meeting reached a consensus that the common niche for the RCS to pursue is Youth Empowerment. This means more engagement with youth, more interaction with them, more connectivity through social media and more capacity building to create change. Ultimately, we believe in a Commonwealth of change that is relevant to our communities and transforms the lives of people at the grassroots.

VRA Deserves Applause for Choosing Wind Power over Coal

Earlier this week, the environmental movement in Ghana was thrown into frenzy, following the announcement by the Volta River Authority (VRA) of its plans to construct a 150MW wind power plant to supplement power generation in the country. The project to be completed in two phases is said to be under the Renewable Development Programme of the organization, Ghana’s main electric power utility corporation.

A wind farm in Kenya

The Ghana Youth Environmental Movement (GYEM) and other campaigners and supporters of renewable energy took to social media minutes after the media announcement to celebrate the impending and inevitable victory of clean energy over dirty energy— demonstrating the underlining relevance rather than a superficial reveling, considering the Ghana government, just a couple of months ago was advancing plans to build a 2x350MW coal fired plant in the Ekumfi Aboano with coal imports from South Africa.

The fuss here is about the VRA’s sharp U-turn on the subject of coal and now wind power. Before campaigners from GYEM took on the idea of importing pollution from coal into the country with coordinated street campaigns in support of renewable energy, notably solar and wind power, the VRA’s position on dirty energy was unequivocal: the country needed to diversify it’s existing energy portfolio with a cheaper, proven and reliable technology to help optimize hydro resources and they believed coal power was the way to go.

In a statement announcing the 150MW wind power project, their position seemed to have been altered incredibly in just a few months in favor of renewables. The Principal Engineer for Renewable and Integrated Resource Development of the VRA, Mr. Ebenezer Antwi declaring that “technology in renewable energy had matured and the cost declined over the years, making it cheaper, therefore the need to consider wind and solar energy to ease pressure on hydro power generation”.

The most relevant point here is that the government acknowledges that the cost of renewable energy is tumbling incredibly at an unprecedented pace globally that it makes the mantra that fossil fuels are cheaper pretty underwhelming and factually fraudulent.

A recent report by Bloomberg indicates that renewables are beating fossil fuels 2 to 1. It indicates that “while two years of crashing prices for oil, natural gas, and coal triggered dramatic downsizing in those industries, renewables have been thriving. Clean energy investment broke new records in 2015 and is now seeing twice as much global funding as fossil fuels”.

This is a fact not open for argument and one will wonder why it took the Government of Ghana that long to notice it. But this is why the VRA deserves applause. They have recognized that politics is about policy and policy is about the search of alternatives— outcomes that are better than others. Wind and solar will keep expanding at record rates and we have to plug ourselves into the opportunities they offer to transition into a low carbon economy and towards climate resilience as outlined by our National Climate Change Policy (NCCP).

It is now or never!