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Ethnicity as an Explanatory Factor in the Ghana 2000 Elections

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 May 2016

Paul Nugent
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Extract

Ghana opened a new chapter in its checkered political history when in December 2000 the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) was removed from office by means of the ballot box. The New Patriotic Party (NPP) won half the parliamentary seats and its presidential candidate, John A. Kufuor, triumphed with something to spare in the second round of balloting. Although there were some violent incidents that marred the proceedings, the assessment of most observers was that the polls were well conducted and that the final result accurately reflected how Ghanaians had actually voted.

Type
Research Article
Information
African Issues , Volume 29 , Issue 1-2 , 2001 , pp. 2 - 7
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 2001 

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References

Notes

1. Nugent, Paul, “Winners, Losers and Also Rans: Money, Moral Authority and Voting Patterns in the Ghana 2000 Election,” African Affairs 100 (2001): 405–428 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. This may be read in conjunction with Nugent, Paul, “Living in the Past: Urban, Rural and Ethnic Themes in the 1992 and 1996 Elections,” Journal of Modern African Studies 37, no. 2 (1999): 287–319 CrossRefGoogle Scholar and “The Things That Money Can Buy: Chieftaincy, the Media and the 1996 Elections in Hohoe-North Constituency,” Ghana Studies 4 (2001).

2. If anything, the ethnicization of politics has been even more dramatic in Côte d’Ivoire in recent years, although, ironically, here the former single party was ultimately one of the casualties.

3. Nugent, “Winners, Losers and Also Rans,” pp. 419-420.

4. On this point, see Lentz, Carola and Nugent, Paul, “Ethnicity in Ghana: A Comparative Perspective,” in Ethnicity in Ghana: The Limits of Invention, ed. Lentz, Carola and Nugent, Paul (Houndmills & New York: Macmillan & St. Martin’s Press, 2000), pp. 10–14 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5. Such was the case with the Akyems who moved to found the Akuapem state and with Asantes who fled to Akyem Abuakwa in 1874.

6. The quite substantial variations in Akan culture come across in the contributions to Mondes Akan: Identité et Pouvoir en Afrique Occidentale/Akan Worlds: Identity and Power in West Africa, ed. Valsecchi, Pierluigi and Viti, Fabio (Paris and Montreal: l’Harmattan, 1999)Google Scholar.

7. McCaskie, T.C., State and Society in Pre-Colonial Asante (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995)Google Scholar. For changes in the rules of engagement in the colonial period, see Jean Allman, “Be(com)ing Asante, Be(com)ing Akan: Thoughts on Gender, Identity and the Colonial Encounter,” in Ethnicity in Ghana, ed. Lentz and Nugent.

8. Gilbert, Michelle, “No Condition Is Permanent: Ethnic Construction and the Use of History in Akuapem,” Africa 67 (1997)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

9. The Nasara Club lobbied within the NPP, and the Co-zongo and Savanna Clubs did likewise in the NDC.

10. An example of the confusion of ethnicity with regionalism is Asare Otchere Darko, “Decentralisation Rather Than a Northerner for Veep Will Give Better Ethnic Balance,” Ghanaian Chronicle, August 8–10, 2000. In the perceptions of many southerners, “the North” is a place and a pretty foreign one at that. But clearly the north, which is divided into the Northern, Upper East, and Upper West regions, can only exist in relation to “the South,” which is not in itself a meaningful focus of self-identification for southerners.

11. The NPP alleged during the runoff that the NDC was trying to scare northerners and Ewes about the consequences of a Kufuor victory.

12. I had the good fortune of being able to attend this congress. These Voltarians were also singled out in the NPP manifesto, Agenda for Positive Change: Manifesto 2000 of the New Patriotic Party, p. vii.

13. Chris Okyere, “The December 8 War at Bawku ... Time for a Lasting Solution to the Kusasi-Mamprusi Conflict,” Daily Graphic, January 10, 2001.

14. Hagan’s share of the vote was a whole percentage point lower than Kwabena Darko’s (2.8%) and only a smidgeon greater than Emmanuel Erskine (1.7%) had managed in 1992. If the NIP and PHP percentages are totaled to give us some idea of where the proto-CPP stood in 1992, the figure of 4.5 percent stands well above the 1.8 percent share polled in 2000.

15. Only in Effia-Kwesimintsim did the PCP beat the NDC candidate by a substantial margin: 34,958 to 17,153 votes. The seat was taken with ease by the NPP four years later.

16. Although surprisingly the PNC lost the Bimbilla seat to Dr. Mohammed Ibn Chambas of the NDC, it took the West Mamprusi, Bolgatanga, and Sissala seats from the ruling party. Sissala was Limann’s home area, but the NDC had won the seat in 1996.

17. His total number of votes also declined.

18. It also won the two seats in the Volta region, which were largely Akan.

19. Limann took 72.6 percent of the vote in Greater Accra region as a whole.

20. There is a very persistent misconception that the Volta region is populated by Ewes, whereas Ewe-speakers occupy only the southern half of the region. However, other groups have harbored many of the same fears of the NPP.