The Centre for Public Opinion and Awareness (CenPOA) has criticized the August 4 Founders’ Day, introduced by the New Patriotic Party (NPP), arguing that it has led to confusion and division and should be abolished.
Executive Director of CenPOA, Michael Donyina Mensah, contends that the holiday, intended to unify the nation, has instead created discord and distorted Ghana’s history.
He emphasized that Ghanaians generally accept August 4 as Founders’ Day without issue, as the country continues to develop and unify. However, he argues that using the holiday to undermine Dr. Kwame Nkrumah’s role as Ghana’s founder is misleading and dishonest.
Donyina’s comments respond to President Akufo-Addo’s rejection of Kwame Nkrumah’s role as the founder of Ghana. While acknowledging that other figures contributed to Ghana’s independence, Donyina criticized the President’s remarks for misrepresenting the historical facts and the purpose of the holiday.
“However, if you want to use the Founders’ Day celebration as a means to discredit Dr. Kwame Nkrumah and state categorically that he was not the founder of Ghana, then this is dishonesty, disingenuous, and a distortion of our history. I will disagree with you on that,” he said.
He also highlighted the need to review and possibly revise Ghana’s holidays to better reflect national identity and unity.
“The idea behind the introduction of August 4 was good, but in recent times, it seems the holiday has lost its focus and is no longer serving its purpose. So as an organisation, we are proposing for it to be scrapped. In the future, when a new administration takes over, we want the holiday to be scrapped. This is because it doesn’t represent any unity; rather, it is bringing division and disagreements among Ghanaians. The holiday also represents the disagreements and confusion that came up in the past during the independence struggle.
“The agenda should be about unity. But the way President Akufo-Addo is misrepresenting the facts and history is troubling. So August 4 can no longer represent its purpose of uniting the country. The founders are supposed to come together in unity to build the country, but if this holiday is beginning to represent division and confusion, then it is something we have to do away with. We are proposing that when a new administration takes over, they should probably find a better alternative to replace this holiday because, as it stands now, this holiday cannot serve any useful purpose.”
Mr Donyina criticized the current holidays for being tied to the colonial past and advocated for celebrations that truly define Ghanaian identity and milestones.
In conclusion, he urged the next government to consider abolishing the August 4 holiday, as it has become a source of controversy rather than unity.
“Several of the holidays are linked to our colonial past. We are moving forward, and so we should have holidays that define us as a people. I strongly opined that our Independence Day celebration should define our struggle for independence and Founders Day. But to create multiple holidays for various activities leading to our independence is needless and a waste. The holidays should be nationalistic, celebrate certain important milestones, and also last forever.
“I want to stress that, going into the future, the August 4 holiday will not serve any useful purpose in Ghana because President Akufo-Addo has ended up surrounding it with confusion. So we are appealing to the next administration to scrap the holiday when they take over. We will petition a new government to scrap it,” he said.