ELECTIONS THROUGH MY EYES

ELECTIONS THROUGH MY EYES

The Election Day was finally here and I was determined to make it to my polling station as early as I could, so I would not have to spend the whole day queuing to vote. It turned out my ‘early’, which was 4.30am, was not as early as I thought, as I was welcomed with the sight of numbers of people who had obviously spent the night there. I wondered whether it was out of patriotism or out of convenience (like in my case). Before I could come up with an answer however, my thoughts were drowned out by the ruckus going on about how we should queue and where. The slight confusion was quickly settled, though not noiselessly, by a polling agent who finally gave us some direction as to what to do.

By the time I had found a comfortable place to sit in my zone’s queue (a poor cement block had now become my chair); the sun was already rising, making the clearly tired faces more visible to me. Despite the obvious anxiety to start voting, people were still willing to volunteer information to ‘newcomers’ as to which line they should join, or at least to give a smile to an occasional joke that was cracked to ease any tension that could be felt in the air.

By 7.00am, people had started yelling “Aban, 7 abo oh”, which indirectly means “it is 7.00am Electoral Commission. Let us vote.” That was of course after they had made it very clear to the polling agents that they wanted the booths to face us, so we could see everything going on. We needed every form of transparency we could possibly get at that time. Not too long after, the voting process began and went on smoothly due to the commitment of a self-appointed ‘queue monitor’, who took it upon himself to make sure the line moved smoothly with his constant “Hey, you are next.”

All the way over at the other side of the polling station, in another queue, I could hear loud exchanges which I later found out to be from irate people who did not understand why people were trying to jump the queue, or simply why they had been directed to join the wrong line because some people did not know the difference between the alphabets ‘G’ and ‘J’.

By 7.45am, I left my zone, a satisfied first time voter, now waiting till evening to hear the results trickle in, no doubt like every interested Ghanaian was. In waiting back home, I kept flipping through television channels to remain updated on what was going on in various parts of the country. One thing that struck me was the constant number of peace songs that kept being played to remind Ghanaians that “Peace is all we need”. This made me wonder: Should our peace or stability be tied only to elections every four years? Is our peace really a tradable item for political power?

Sadly however, some people are willing to give up their lives and the little they have, not for their country, but for the people they support. The reality is that the people we are sometimes willing to ‘lose our lives for’ have not even met us directly or been of much help to us. Yet all it takes is a clarion call, and people will gladly pour out onto the streets.

It is often said that ‘Experience is the best teacher’; but sometimes we need to learn from the mistakes of others. Wrongful or misplaced zeal has never helped any group of people or country, as seen in civil wars and other terrible prices paid. It is up to us as Ghanaians not to place the destiny and peace of our nation into the hands of just a few people. Ghana belongs to us all, and this is a truth we need to be aware of not only during the election period, but every moment of our lives. Better yet, our prayers for Ghana should not be tied to selective moments in the nation’s life, but should rather be the constant burden we carry for our country each and every day.

Have you ever stopped to ask yourself why you are a Ghanaian and not a citizen of any other country? Your purpose could be as hidden as praying in your closet for the nation’s wellbeing, or as big as being the President of Ghana someday. Whatever our purpose may be, Ghana depends on us for posterity as much as we depend on her. Ghana could be much better because of you. May our interest in the country span beyond any number of elections we may ever have to witness.

GOD BLESS GHANA.

LONG LIVE GHANA.