Features
Economic impact of Russia, Ukraine conflict
Since the Second World War the world has done all it can to ensure that peace prevails in all countries so that petty conflicts between nations or among nations can be avoided.
Unfortunately, this has not been the case and the world is still frightened with conflicts among nations. We experienced the Iran- Iraq war as well as the US invasion of Iraq following Iraq’s invasion of the tiny country nearby.
INVASION OF KUWAIT
This tiny country, Kuwait, was invaded by Iraq and as a result the US and other interested Western countries thought that the time had come to teach Iraq a lesson. This was the basis of that conflict and subsequent war that took place between the US and Iraq when it was under Saddam Hussein.
Quite recently, the world woke up on 24th February, 2022, to hear about the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. It is difficult to understand why a conflict of this nature should emerge when the world has just experienced the COVID-19 pandemic and is now doing all it can to recover economically.
RECOVERY PROCESS
In fact many countries are still going through their recovery process and the world today is faced with serious economic challenges unbearable for many people in different countries. It is against this background that we find it very disturbing when we see the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
The invasion of Ukraine by Russia is very unfortunate but one can see that Russia is trying to flex its muscles to show that it is still in control of affairs when it comes to Eastern European politics. Under the former Soviet Union, Russia was a powerful country.
USSR POWER
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), then a powerful eastern bloc, adopted strategies to fight Western countries which were members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). It is the suspicion of Russia that Ukraine is getting closer to form an alliance with NATO and for this reason should be stopped before things get too late for that country.
Ukraine, on the other hand, considers itself a sovereign country which should not be invaded by another country such as Russia. For this reason, Ukraine, has put up a spirited fight to stop the Russian invasion of their country.
It is said that when two elephants fight it is the grass that suffers and so the rest of the world sitting by and thinking about how to recover fully from the COVID-19 pandemic have now been drawn into this needless fight in a number of waves.
ECONOMIC IMPACT
To begin with, the tremendous impact of the conflict is beyond measure in the sense that it has created shortage of crude oil on the international market. The shortage of crude oil is affecting the economies of countries in the world.
In Ghana, for instance, a litre of oil is shooting upwards day in day out and the price will soon be 10 Ghana Cedis or even more. This is, needless to say, seriously affecting the economy of the country in the sense that prices of all other things have started rising.
Apart from Ghana, other countries on the African continent are also experiencing economic difficulties which are adversely affecting the welfare of people. This is not the making of their respective governments on the continent but rather the direct result of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine which has resulted in shortages of oil and the rising prices in the world.
IMPORTS
Apart from oil prices, imports from different parts of the world have also risen very high. This does not affect only African countries but all countries in the world. European as well as America, Asia and all other countries in the different parts of the world are experiencing this adverse impact for which reason prices are going to be unbearable.
This explains why citizens in various countries would have to bear with their governments, seeing that it is not the meeting of any particular government but something disastrous that is affecting the entire world. This calls for every person in the world to come together and think of how to bear with this unfortunate situation instead of simply blaming governments for something they are not responsible for.
PURPOSE OF GOVERNMENT
The purpose of government as well as governance is to ensure that life is made better for every citizen. However, in this particular case life cannot be better for everybody when we all know for sure that there are shortages of oil on the world markets and, therefore, pushing up prices that would also make life uncomfortable for us in different countries.
It is for this reason that the world must come together to tell Russia and Ukraine that “enough is enough” and the war must stop. If the war does not stop, prices of goods and services will keep escalating in all parts of the world in this COVID-19 era.
UNFORTUNATE SITUATION
It is very unfortunate that things are happening this way but we do not have to lose hope and fight among ourselves because of economic difficulties. Even if governments are changed the result will not be better because until the Russia-Ukraine war is stopped, the world will continue to experience high prices and this would impact negatively on people in all countries.
When it comes to developing countries whose economies are fragile, we need to remain united so that adventurists will not take advantage of the situation to create instability in their respective countries. It is the expectation. of all countries that diplomatic efforts will be put in place to resolve the issue between Russia and Ukraine so that normal peace can be experienced between the two countries.
PEACE
When peace returns, it will spread to all parts of the world and make life better for each every country and person.
Contact email/whatsApp address of author:
Pradmat2013@gmail.com (0553318911)
By Dr. Kofi Amponsah-Bediako
Features
Tears of Ghanaman, home and abroad
The typical native of Sikaman is by nature a hospitable creature, a social animal with a big heart, a soul full of the milk of earthly goodness, and a spirit too loving for its own comfort.
Ghanaman hosts a foreign pal and he spends a fortune to make him very happy and comfortable-good food, clean booze, excellent accommodation and a woman for the night.
Sometimes the pal leaves without saying a “thank you but Ghanaman is not offended. He’d host another idiot even more splendidly. His nature is warm, his spirit benevolent. That is the typical Ghanaian and no wonder that many African-Americans say, “If you haven’t visited Ghana. Then you’ve not come to Africa.
You can even enter the country without a passport and a visa and you’ll be welcomed with a pot of palm wine.
If Ghanaman wants to go abroad, especially to an European country or the United States, it is often after an ordeal.
He has to doze in a queue at dawn at the embassy for days and if he is lucky to get through to being interviewed, he is confronted by someone who claims he or she has the power of discerning truth from lie.
In short Ghanaman must undergo a lie-detector test and has to answer questions that are either nonsensical or have no relevance to the trip at hand. When Joseph Kwame Korkorti wanted a visa to an European country, the attache studied Korkorti’s nose for a while and pronounced judgment.
“The way I see you, you won’t return to Ghana if I allow you to go. Korkorti nearly dislocated her jaw; Kwasiasem akwaakwa. In any case what had Korkorti’s nose got to do with the trip?
If Ghanaman, after several attempts, manages to get the visa and lands in the whiteman’s land, he is seen as another monkey uptown, a new arrival of a degenerate ape coming to invade civilized society. He is sneered at, mocked at and avoided like a plague. Some landlords abroad will not hire their rooms to blacks because they feel their presence in itself is bad business.
When a Sikaman publisher landed overseas and was riding in a public bus, an urchin who had the impudence and notoriety of a dead cockroach told his colleagues he was sure the black man had a tail which he was hiding in his pair of trousers. He didn’t end there. He said he was in fact going to pull out the tail for everyone to see.
True to his word he went and put his hand into the backside of the bewildered publisher, intent on grabbing his imaginary tail and pulling it out. It took a lot of patience on the part of the publisher to avert murder. He practically pinned the white miscreant on the floor by the neck and only let go when others intervene. Next time too…
The way we treat our foreign guests in comparison with the way they treat us is polar contrasting-two disparate extremes, one totally incomparable to the other. They hound us for immigration papers, deport us for overstaying and skinheads either target homes to perpetrate mayhem or attack black immigrants to gratify their racial madness
When these same people come here we accept them even more hospitably than our own kin. They enter without visas, overstay, impregnate our women and run away.
About half of foreigners in this country do not have valid resident permits and was not a bother until recently when fire was put under the buttocks of the Immigration Service
In fact, until recently I never knew Sikaman had an Immigration Service. The problem is that although their staff look resplendent in their green outfit, you never really see them anywhere. You’d think they are hidden from the public eye.
The first time I saw a group of them walking somewhere, I nearly mistook them for some sixth-form going to the library. Their ladies are pretty though.
So after all, Sikaman has an Immigration Service which I hear is now alert 24 hours a day tracking down illegal aliens and making sure they bound the exit via Kotoka International. A pat on their shoulder.
I am glad the Interior Ministry has also realised that the country has been too slack about who goes out or comes into Sikaman.
Now the Ministry has warned foreigners not to take the country’s commitment to its obligations under the various conditions as a sign of weakness or a source for the abuse of her hospitality.
“Ghana will not tolerate any such abuse,” Nii Okaija Adamafio, the Interior Minister said, baring his teeth and twitching his little moustache. He was inaugurating the Ghana Refugee and Immigration Service Boards.
He said some foreigners come in as tourists, investors, consultants, skilled workers or refugees. Others come as ‘charlatans, adventurers or plain criminals. “
Yes, there are many criminals among them. Our courts have tried a good number of them for fraud and misconduct.
It is time we welcome only those who would come and invest or tour and go back peacefully and not those whose criminal intentions are well-hidden but get exposed in due course of time.
This article was first published on Saturday March 14, 1998
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Features
Decisions have consequences
In this world, it is always important to recognise that every action or decision taken, has consequences.
It can result in something good or bad, depending on the quality of the decision, that is, the factors that were taken into account in the decision making.
The problem with a bad decision is that, in some instances, there is no opportunity to correct the result even though you have regretted the decision, which resulted in the unpleasant outcome.
This is what a friend of mine refers to as having regretted an unregretable regret. After church last Sunday, I was watching a programme on TV and a young lady was sharing with the host, how a bad decision she took, had affected her life immensely and adversely.
She narrated how she met a Caucasian and she got married to him. The white man arranged for her to join him after the marriage and processes were initiated for her to join her husband in UK. It took a while for the requisite documentation to be procured and during this period, she took a decision that has haunted her till date.
According to her narration, she met a man, a Ghanaian, who she started dating, even though she was a married woman.
After a while her documents were ready and so she left to join her husband abroad without breaking off the unholy relationship with the man from Ghana.
After she got to UK, this man from Ghana, kept pressuring her to leave the white man and return to him in Ghana. The white man at some point became a bit suspicious and asked about who she has been talking on the phone with for long spells, and she lied to him that it was her cousin.
Then comes the shocker. After the man from Ghana had sweet talked her continuously for a while, she decided to leave her husband and return to Ghana after only three weeks abroad.
She said, she asked the guy to swear to her that he would take care of both her and her mother and the guy swore to take good care of her and her mother as well as rent a 3-bedroom flat for her. She then took the decision to leave her husband and return to Ghana.
She told her mum that she was returning to Ghana to marry the guy in Ghana. According to her, her mother vigorously disagreed with her decision and wept.
She further added that her mum told her brother and they told her that they were going to tell her husband about her intentions.
According to her, she threatened that if they called her husband to inform him, then she would commit suicide, an idea given to her by the boyfriend in Ghana.
Her mum and brother afraid of what she might do, agreed not to tell her husband. She then told her husband that she was returning to Ghana to attend her Grandmother’s funeral.
The husband could not understand why she wanted to go back to Ghana after only three weeks stay so she had to lie that in their tradition, grandchildren are required to be present when the grandmother dies and is to be buried.
She returned to Ghana; the flat turns into a chamber and hall accommodation, the promise to take care of her mother does not materialise and generally she ends up furnishing the accommodation herself. All the promises given her by her boyfriend, turned out to be just mere words.
A phone the husband gave her, she left behind in UK out of guilty conscience knowing she was never coming back to UK.
Through that phone and social media, the husband found out about his boyfriend and that was the end of her marriage.
Meanwhile, things have gone awry here in Ghana and she had regretted and at a point in her narration, was trying desperately to hold back tears. Decisions indeed have consequences.
NB: ‘CHANGE KOTOKA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT TO KOFI BAAKO INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT’
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