Happy New Year. And an Update on Ghana!

Eww, 2009 is already in, and we are alive. Is traditional to lampoon the old year, and wish everyone and sundry a great new year.

I will toe that line, to an extent. And also admit that there are a few people that I would not wish a ‘happy new year’. I made a resolution of being err, truthful. Bite me.

In Africa, this is good news, (a peaceful regime change...) so I will post it here.

Opposition leader wins Ghana poll

Mr Atta Mills lost Ghana's two previous elections to President Kufuor
Opposition candidate John Atta Mills has won a tight presidential run-off in Ghana, electoral officials have said.

The announcement came after results from the last constituency to vote showed him extending his lead over his rival, Nana Akufo-Addo.

Mr Akufo-Addo's ruling party boycotted Friday's vote, in Tain constituency.

Both sides have alleged vote-rigging in the poll. The run-off was closely watched as Ghana remains a rare example of democracy in West Africa.
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Just saw this tongue-in-cheek headline from the Monitor newspaper here, and I just could not help myself! Here is the article.

An African Opposition rigs a govt out of power!

Ghana can be quite an interesting country. It pioneered independence in 1958 then followed that closely with pioneering coups by overthrowing its independence leader Kwame Nkuruma and now to becoming the first country on the continent where a ruling party has publicly admitted that an election it organised was stolen by the Opposition to the ruling party’s detriment.

In fact the ruling party, the New Patriotic Front of outgoing President John Kufuor whose candidate Nana Akufo-Ado was by Friday still trailing narrowly against the Opposition’s John Ata Mills went as far as announcing how it was boycotting an election in a remote constituency that was expected to be a decider to the Presidential election.

And the reason the party in government wanted the election postponed, “because we think the security situation on the ground is not conducive for a free and fair election,” NPP spokesman Arthur Kennedy told AFP news agency.”

The best New Year present to the continent if you asked me....!

The writer is Charles Mwanghya