commemorating Kwame Nkrumah on Founder's Day

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Today, the Pan-African Institute for Socialism joins our comrades in the Socialist Movement of Ghana and the Ghanian people in general in commemorating Kwame Nkrumah on Founders’ Day. Founders’ Day commemorates Nkrumah, the first president of independent Ghana, as well as celebrating the contribution of the Big Six. The Big Six were the six leaders of the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC), one of the leading political parties in the British colony of the Gold Coast, known after independence as Ghana.

Who was Kwame Nkrumah?

Kwame Nkrumah was born as Francis Nwia Kofi Ngonloma in 1909 in the coastal town of Nkroful, in what was British colonial Gold Coast. Nkroful is closer to Côte d’Ivoire than it is to the capital Accra. Nkrumah was born into a harshly repressive and inhumane system that became the centre of the slave trade which began in 1482 when the Portuguese who were the first Europeans arrived on the Gold Coast.

Growing up his father was frequently away due to being a migrant labour, a labour system that was commonly practised in most parts of sub-Saharan Africa by the turn of the twentieth century. As a result, Nkrumah grew up within a female headed household.

Nkrumah was brought up Catholic and attended a missionary school. He studied to be a teacher at Achimota School in Accra from 1925 to 1935.

For the following five years he worked as a teacher in several schools in the Gold Coast including at Achimota in Elmina to save up money to continue his education in the United States of America. In 1935, he travelled to England so he could apply and received his student visa from the American Embassy.

It was while Nkrumah was in London in late 1935 that he heard the news of the Invasion of Abyssinia (present day Ethiopia) by the then fascist government of Italy led by Benito Mussolini. This invasion outraged the young Nkrumah. This invasion resulted in the military occupation of Abyssinia by the beginning of March 1936 and the exile of Emperor Haile Selassie.

In the year between 1935 and 1943 Nkrumah was based in the United States and in that time completed two master’s degrees one in science and the other in Philosophy. It was during this time that he met the likes of Trinidadian socialist C.L.R. James and began working within a socialist network.

In 1945 he returned to London to study at the London School of Economics. While studying Nkrumah remained politically active and this became an incredibly politically productive time in his life. In London he met George Padmore, Trinidadian socialist Pan Africanist who was deeply influential in shaping Nkrumah’s ideas around Pan Africanism and together they organised the 5^th Pan African Congress that was held in Manchester. He also helped start the West African National Secretariat to work towards the decolonization of Africa. Nkrumah served as Vice-President of the West African Students’ Union (WASU).

His political activism during his period in London did not go unnoticed and in 1947 Nkrumah returned to Ghana as he was invited to serve as the General Secretary of the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) under leadership of Joseph Boakye Danquah. Within a year of his arrival back to the Gold Coast protests broke out amongst ex-servicemen against the rising cost of living. On the 28 February 1948 the ruling British government sought to quell the resistance with violence injuring 60 protesters and killing three. This sparked more protests in several cities of the Gold Coast. By the end of the protest the entire leadership of the UGCC, including Nkrumah was arrested in the beginning of March. By the time they were released Nkrumah had emerged as a major youth leader within the UGCC.

The next year was incredibly politically productive for Nkrumah who took an extensive tour of the country to build up his power and various alliances. He proclaimed that the Gold Coast needed “self-governance now”. He importantly included women within his political activism and built a strong power base with the Cocoa farmer as well as alliances with the labour movement.

On 12 June 1949, he organized these groups into a new political party: The Convention People’s Party (CPP). In response, and to side-line the growing power of Nkrumah the British convened a selected commission of middle-class Africans, to draft a new constitution that would give Ghana more self-governance. Under the new constitution, only those with money and property would be allowed to vote. However, Nkrumah and the CPP continued to agitate and put forward the alternative for universal franchise without property qualifications. This was proposal was rejected by the British.

When the colonial administration rejected the People’s Assembly’s recommendations, Nkrumah organized a “Positive Action” campaign on 1 January 1950, including civil disobedience, non-cooperation, boycotts, and strikes. That day, the colonial administration arrested Nkrumah and many CPP supporters and he was sentenced to three years in prison. However, the growing international protests and internal resistance to colonial rule led the British to acquiesce to the demands of the CPP and in just over a year later Britain organized the Gold Coast legislative elections. This was the first general election to be held under universal franchise, from 5–10 February 1951. Though Nkrumah was still imprisoned the CPP emerged with a landslide victory. In 1952 Nkrumah became Prime Minister of Ghana and retained the position when Ghana declared its independence from Britain in 1957. In 1960, Ghanaians approved a new constitution and elected Nkrumah President.

One of the lasting legacies of President Kwame Nkrumah on the continent has not only been his rich intellectual, political and socialist contribution but has also been the establishment of the Organisation of African Unity, which was the first experiments of creating a united Africa. One of key works, “Class Struggle in Africa” can be downloaded here.

Nkrumah gave a seminal speech that is the cornerstone of Pan-Africanism at the inaugural ceremony of the OAU Conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in 1963. Listen to it below.