“Hungry man say fix the country belly full man say fix yourself”, who really needs fixing? This is an introduction to a song by Afriyie a popular Ghanaian musician in a song titled ‘Country Hot’. It’s a beautiful musical piece which seeks to address the ills in our society through the power of music.
Throughout world history, musicians then and now all appreciates the influence of music and have been able to use it positively in effecting change in their immediate environment through carefully selected lyrics that has helped inspire social and cultural transformation.
The likes of Bob Marley, Michael Jackson and Fela Kuti have positively used music to change their immediate environment and the world at large. Fela kuti as a prolific Nigerian musician did not only focus his attention on the fusion of African musical style into the European musical culture but was very critical on the political leaders and systems of his time. He became the peoples favorite overtime because they saw him to be their mouth piece on issues relating to their wellbeing through his music. Songs like Why Black Man Dey Suffer (1971), Zombie (1977) and Shuffering and Shmiling (1978) buzzed the political space as the political leaders felt threatened with the level of awareness those songs created among the masses.
In today’s Ghana, there’s an ongoing youth activism with the hashtag fix the country which naturally started on several social media platforms as a result of some youth venting their anger on the neglect on good governance and loss of hope for the future because of failed systems and how various political leaders continues to manage the country in a way which appear not to bring about any significant development confuses them and make them go outrage.
Fix the country is being responded with fix yourself by those with the opinion that individual uprightness is the best way forward for a country’s advancement. But one may ask, which
comes first as a determining factor to the progress of a country? It is appropriate to assert that citizens of any country have a greater responsibility in the advancement of that nation but it is also essential to acknowledge that with no sense of any proper leadership to lead and direct affairs in a definite course, no nation can ever progress. The conversation needs to start from the top as to the Ghanaian and the Ghana we want in the foreseeable future.
The developed world and the fastest growing economies made a significant about-turn to their enviable current status not because they are ordained by any prophet, advantaged by their geographical location or as a result their racial background. The answer can be found in a conscious investment in meritocratic civil service and public administration by transformational leaders. There can never be any prosperous developed state anywhere without a robust and skilled meritocratic civil service. Leadership needs to invest more in building strong institutions to be able to move the citizenry along a sustainable development agenda than concentrating more on politicians and political leadership.
Alexander the Great once said “I am not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep, I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion”
He sorts to exert practical leadership skills between the two animals and bring to bear how a tactful and strategic headship can lead to a paradigm shift in any situation.
A lion has great leadership skills and while the army of lions may be stronger, the army of sheep led by a lion would have better strategy and support to success because lions led by a sheep may lose since a sheep doesn’t have any great leadership skills to command an army to victory.
Putting it in the perspective of the Ghanaian situation, Ghanaians as individuals may not only be able to purge themselves of bribery, corruption, nepotism and contravention of laws with impunity without a leadership with a vision and workable plans to fulfil them. The essence of leaders and why we delegate all powers which comes with the needed freebies to make their work easier in thinking is to make sure they lead us to a promise land with action and not to advice.
Mr. Henry Quartey the greater Accra regional minister and David Asante of Ghana publishing company are both living testimonies to what W. Clement Stone (1902-2002) wrote in his book, The Success System That Never Fails (1962) “Don’t expect what you don’t inspect”. It tells us to inspect the performance of our subordinates as to get the improvement we expect because what the boss (leader) watches gets done well. The Ghanaian youth is ready for change that’s why leadership is been called upon to #fixthecountry so we can fall in line to #fixourself accordingly.
I am Nana Effah, I write my mind.
effahjnrgh@gmail.com
