This weekend is a three-day weekend, and not because of July 4th, America’s Independence Day. Here in Ghana, today is Republic Day, which is separate and different from Ghana’s Independence Day (March 6).
On this day, in 1960, Kwame Nkrumah was inaugurated as the first president of the first independent Black African nation. But it took some time to get to that point.
Ghana’s Independence
Ghana gained its independence from Britain in 1957, but the rumblings for that really got going 10 years earlier with the establishment of the United Gold Coast[1] Convention (UGCC) by J.B. Danquah, which aimed to bring about self-governance in “the shortest possible time.”
Nkrumah became the General Secretary of the UGCC in December 1947, after attending the historically Black college Lincoln college in Pennsylvania and later the London School of Economics.
Nkrumah and Danquah disagreed about the path to independence, and after two years heading the UGCC, Nkrumah left and founded the Convention People’s Party (CPP). In the intervening years, Britain tried to keep the Gold Coast as a colony, but ultimately on 6 March 1957, Ghana (renamed in 1956, with the name being chosen during the vote for independence and suggested by Nkrumah) gained its independence.
Becoming a Republic
Three years after gaining independence, Nkrumah announced a new constitution for Ghana that would make it a republic. Presidential elections and a vote on a referendum on the new constitution were held on 27 April, with the constitution being ratified and Nkrumah defeating Danquah resoundingly.
Today, Republic Day is also observed as a day to honor senior citizens, for their parts played in the independence struggle.
[1] The British Colonial name for what is presently Ghana, was The Gold Coast.
