Ghana’s culture falsely equates old age to maturity and this is insisted upon at every forum and situation. If you are younger and dared to be confident in your vision and abilities, you are quickly and recklessly regarded as disrespectful and insolent. If the old folks believe that they have all the wisdom in the world and prefer to be in complete control of affairs, is it then not accurate for me to state that they are fully in charge of the poverty generation and disease embattled society that exist in Ghana.The old bury their achievements and watch the young and new struggle to begin from scratch and they sit with their old wisdom wondering why poverty exists. Having their hands on all the wealth of this poor country but unwilling to spend on education, research and development. Suffocating the thoughts of the young and turning around to point that finger into their face in anguish, accusing the young of lacking knowledge. I was peeved into writing this piece by what a government official said recently in Ghana.
Children of Children:
Many here are born to people who barely understood life and living before welcoming a newborn into the world. People grow old by any means and anyhow and now, the fact that they lived longer than others somehow accords them the right to most times humiliate the young at every turn. If you lived successfully, then you must know that the greatest treasure of this life is to be young and young at heart. They will not look at the youth with disdain and pity, youthfulness is a great treasure and I will not be in a hurry to be old and actually will refuse to be old.
I love being young and I will always encourage the young people to cherish their youth, dream and aspire as though the whole world depended on their dreams. The life of the world is for us to create, to contribute in synthesizing the needed structures driven by love and empathy.
Moral Dyslexia:
Those who insist youthfulness is not profitable, that those who have not seen their number of years on this earth are far inferior that themselves, please seek redemption because you are suffering from a moral dyslexia. Unable to read through the logical scripts life has given us, life’s greatest gift is the young and the new, that youthfulness is the greatest treasure to the world. The young, the youthful and the young at heart, life is on your side, do not allow those who believe their best is in the past to rob you of your joy. The best is always yet to come, never embrace the delusional precepts of those who have no hope left and can only draw from the wells of antiquity. I shudder to think of a country and by extension a continent that cherishes the dead and devotes so much time and expense at according the dead a dignified farewell. Cloth the dead in sparkling shroud and leave millions of children naked, hungry and attending school under death traps called classrooms. Wake up people, the young is your greatest treasure.
The root cause of endemic poverty is low maturity levels:
The greatest treasure any parent can bequeath to their young is a strong sense of maturity, a strong desire to dream and to envision life in the best of its glory. There is no need to wait and watch the child pick up the life of their own. Go on and tell them to dream and aspire the moment you can assure yourself that the child can hear and understand you. Once they have imbibed the holistic sense of maturity, you can relax and believe that they will bring out their precious gifts and talents.
In Ghana, even one’s own family will never value them until they are the only old persons around and then they take their turn to repress the younger people. Somehow, people who bask in their old age are under the illusion that only the old is the best, that you are never good enough until you are the only old person around. Immature due to the repression of the old folks, poverty is inevitable, without the desire and the skill to create or acquire the essentials of life. Old and finally absolutely in charge but lacking creative youthful days, there is nothing you can do but corrupt the system further and take all the goodies. And we still wonder why Africa’s future has been taken hostage by corrupt office holders (no leaders here)?
To live longer is to live young for long:
Youthfulness is so despised sometimes in Ghana; to be young is to be unheard, never speaking, grievously dependent and forbidden from dreaming dreams and seeing visions. This has enforced in the young people a relaxed attitude towards life and responsibility, not to think of independence of attitude and will. Look at the younger members of the Atta Mills administration, all they do is to hop from one radio station to the other yelling insults and insinuations at the top of their voices. Maybe it is the desire of the older people to be fully in charge thus pushing the young ministers out just to talking themselves into public relevance.
Infantilization of young people in Ghana:
In a country where all that is good and fine in life is reserved for the old, it will be fair if their claim to such a thrown will have some basic requirements such as the level of bravery and heroic efforts made. Many irresponsible fathers abandon their children to the elements of the weather only to stage a public claim to the riches of these same people. The young is credited with the lowest level of wisdom and responsibility, made to sit and wait, pushed off into boring and irrelevant tasks whilst the totalitarian old folks try to do what they have no idea about. Imagine a retired teacher in charge of the ministry of education, how do you expect such a person to revolutionize the education system? The young, creative, fresh and absolutely frustrated by the existing should have an unparalleled power to create and revolutionize a system and not the old and retired? Look at the heroic effort of Mr. Patrick Awuah, a young and visionary man willing to impact this country and continent through the Ashesi University project.
A government official stands up and declares, “Youth of today are not serious about life- Sena Dansua”. Not true!! Rather too many old people have given up on life. Madam Minister, please understand that majority of the old people in Ghana have long given up on life, and they are stampeding the youth and suffocating their thoughts and visions to the point of despair. So stop blaming the youth and rather clear the old folks out of the way.
To be Young means full of life and living it, the old means passed and passing:
The ideal society is made up of only young people and the young-at-heart; there is no progressive country for old and retired people. The young-at-heart are those old people who always appreciate the power of the youth; the terrible truth is that the young is always better than the old, more intelligent and even more creative. Otherwise, what is the point of reproduction? It is criminal not to allow the new to be better than the old that will not make any biological sense at all. Why procreate lesser versions of an entity? This does not hold in any industry in the world, golf 5 is far better than golf 1 so is the power of the two generations of engineers who created them. I will be personally disappointed if my own children are not intellectually and creatively more superior than I am. I even plan to take them to see places at age 10, where I only got the chance to see at age 31, places like the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington DC.
Mature Young and live Forever Young:
Any one who has read the book “built to last’ by Jim Collins and Jerry Porras of the Stanford University, would discover that more than 90 % of the people who created the great, enduring and visionary companies such as HP, 3M, Merck, were below the age 30. In Ghana life begins at 40, you are only allowed to begin the process of independence when you turn 40 years old. One of the universities in Ghana recently set up a committee to draw the plans for a new research institute, I was appalled to find that all the committee members were many years into their retirement. How do you expect this group to create a futurist institution without ideas from young people working in visionary institutions outside Ghana? The situation in Ghana is rudimentary in many respects and it stands to reason to look to places of the Isaac Newtons and the Albert Einsteins of this world.
My appeal to the young in Ghana is this, please take charge and exercise a full sense of responsibility. Refuse to be intimidated, stampeded and suffocated by people who ascribe to themselves the monopoly of all wisdom based on the simple fact that they are older. Ignore any such distractions and focus, dream dreams, envision a progressive and prosperous future for yourself and proceed to creating it with your own hands. The power and creativity to overcome all the difficult situations in this life is on the side of the young, so proceed in this liberating idea and you will be impressed how far you reach. Look out of Ghana to the Visionary personalities and institutions of this world and learn from them.
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Kindly edited by Gloria Baaba Arkaifie
----------------------------
Patrick Kobina Arthur (PhD),
parthur14@gmail.com
http://pakar1-corner.blogspot.com/
Kobina, I can not help but agree with you on all the issue raised. I am equally peeved and sometime even wonder if I should return to Ghana to contribute. I fear that I will be marginalized and people whom I know can do better turn to work against you. Take for example in our universities. We have old lecturers who have retired and for some reason do not want to give way for younger ones to help. Some also are lazy and yet, when they see a youngster making progress, they turn to make your work difficult. Its sad and I am seriously doubting if at all our nation will progress with this kind of attitude.
ReplyDeleteThank you Solomon for take time to read my article.
ReplyDeleteI am in the University environment and I am trying to make my contribution. But this "I have been here for the past 30 years" is killing me.
Our country is desperately poor and these people look on carelessly and shoving their age and "irrelevant" experience in our face.
I think we have to push down this wall of cultural slavery!
I think your comments will deter foreign investors, especially the younger ones, from the country. In as much as it is true, it is too public and it might have its consequences.
ReplyDeleteYou couldn't have said it better. The truth would always stand out. Pupils face this everyday from their tutors and students face it from their lecturers every time. This behavior doesn't present the African child to think. this is because the child is always scared to take decision for himself because right after you done you would be told to change it immediately. It looks like we are not capable of doing anything on our own. It is not so.... IT IS BECAUSE THE OLDER GENERATION MAKE US SCARED TO THINK !!. you couldn't have said it better........
ReplyDeleteThis is a really sensitive topic which attacks the very soul of the Ghanaian community – our traditions, precepts and ideologies.
ReplyDeleteRight from start of life, we are taught to believe and accept that an elderly person can never be wrong. This is even embossed in most of our proverbs. For example “Opanyin gware a na nsuo asa”, means that the elderly person has the final say in any situation. This is not bad in itself considering the fact that the elderly have passed through life and should have lots of experiences.
The only problem is that this tradition of ours has left the majority of the youth incapacitated. Most young people today lack the ability to reason out situational problems and usually have no dream or vision in life.
The youth are considered the future of every nation but this future either eludes them or never comes. Ghana would have no future if the older generation continues to hang on and not hand over. The Good book says that, the glory of the latter house would be greater than that of the former house.
Change is very necessary and I strongly believe it is in the courts of the youth to effect.
It is indeed very appalling when the dreams and aspirations of the young are thwarted by the old who believe they know it all. It is high time we realise what the true value of youthfulness is so that we are able to tap into such great resource and become a great nation. Empowering the youth is a project the old should embark on rather than sit and demand respect and acknowledgement which sometimes is unmerited. We should advocate for more young people to assume power positions since we are stronger and far more creative than any old man or woman could ever be. The future of this country is dependent on such wise decisions and the old who claim they are wiser should know this.
ReplyDelete"being old doesn't automatically make you wise", Most of the oldies in this society think they have got it all. Yes, they have been through it all, gone through the tough training and have all the experience one would expect, but that doesn't make them the best in all. Modern technology has ruled out most time consuming process which the old still use. The youth who they claim are the future leaders are not given the chance to exhibit their talents. This dampens their morale and doesn't give the youth a shot. This behaviour should be done away with less we risk the effect of producing future leaders that are not confident enough.
ReplyDeletehmmm...we are just opposite the western world in terms of cherishing the youth but we all say the youth are the future leaders. When do they want the youth to be leaders if they are not given them chance? Most of our so called leaders were trained ABROAD. I always ask my self, why can't they just implement even 10% of what they acquired. It is high time the old stopped those (PhD=pull him down and the MBA=me baa 3ha aky3) behaviour and step aside for the youth to take affairs. They should know that their time come pass... long time!!!
ReplyDeleteI appreciate the effort you invest in identifying the flaws in currently existing with us. Things ought to change so we could all merge our thoughts and ideas together so that the nation will progress. It is interesting; we always visit the west but we refuse to learn their way of doing things so we could also challenge ourselves to solve our problems. The earlier we change our way of doing things things the better. I am glad at least we have people who have observed these flaws AND ARE ADVOCATING for a change in attitude.
ReplyDeleteseriously. enough is enough. the old always making the youth feel stupid. I school in the US. do u know thaat it has affected me in many ways?I find it hard/cant even be assertive to dream and think beyound my horizons. if i compare myself to my white classmates, i dont match up in terms of having my own ideas and opinions. its due to the fact that as a child, am always told to shut up and take what adults tell me. I cant reason for myself. its almost impossible for young folks in ghana to step up to the plate and make significant contributions to the nation. We are really incapacitated. everytime i think of ideas to help mother ghana, i feel like it will be thrown out as soon as i mention it. am too young to think. The ghanaian youth can really do something for the nation. Also when someone has a good idea, they use politics, corruption and greed to abort the idea. it makes it hard for some good people to come home. These are the issues to be addressed but no, rather politicians will wake up in the morning and go on radio stations to yell up and down. Its really sad. We have children dieing at hospitals because of light off, we have significant infant mortality due to lack of vaccination, we have poor drinking water, unemployed and uneducated youth, yet we dont address those issues, rather we focus which party is stronger or who can make the most noise.And if a young folk like me try to say something, they will easily shut it down. thats why we are still a "developing country". when at all will we develop?
ReplyDelete