The health of any nation is dependent on the health of the individual citizens of that country, the level and capacity of its educated and trained manpower is also dependent on the educational levels of individual citizens.
The socio cultural, economic and political direction of any nation is also an outcome of the mindset of the citizens which is also a collection and aggregation of their education, health, cultural beliefs and social interactions with each other generally. It is the individual attributes that shape the character of a nation. It must also be admitted that in every society, no matter how enlightened it might be, there are deviants. However, if the deviations in the society become a norm rather than the exception, then that society has a major problem.
Our beloved country has had its ups and downs over the past 58 years across various governments. Ghana and Ghanaians are not angels just as so many others are not, and so we have had our own share of deviants in our society. We have had the mentally deranged, we have had petty thieves, highway robbers, people who defile children, rapists, murderers and perpetrators of any other crimes on earth. It is also true that as population grows, so does the number of deviants. However, it is also the responsibility of the state represented by government to put in place measures which will in the long term reduce the number of deviants in our society and also manage the unrepentant ones within the confines of our laws.
This country is moving in a certain direction which is so worrying and dangerous for today and the future, and all we do is just complain when we become victims or show a little sympathy to the victims. State institutions offer assurances of addressing the problems but the problems keep escalating. When law abiding citizens are murdered, in many instances, the security agencies do not find the perpetrators of those crimes, but when the issues are about police personnel for example, they do so well in arresting the culprits. I remember in the early 1990s, some landguards murdered a policeman popularly known as Ninja and buried him and cast concrete on his grave in an obscure place in Accra. The police did very well in finding the criminals and recovered the body as well.
Recent examples of jail breakers who were re-arrested by the police were good examples of what the Ghana Police Service is capable of doing, but in many instances the police seem to abandon other investigations into murders and other crimes. The criminals have their way and the victims see no justice.
This nation is gradually degenerating into a lawless, chaotic state where crime holds sway over decency. Today, the media, both print and electronic is always full of stories of horrendous crimes of varying nature. Spousal murders have plagued this country in recent times. In most instances, the victims and the culprits are young people. The culprits are arrested and charged before court and perhaps convicted and that ends it.
Our young people are seriously engaged in drugs and other related crimes. The dare devil in them has been pushing them into acts they would ordinarily not engage in; they or some of them get arrested and are put before court, remanded and are forgotten. Crime seems to be a pastime in this country. Morality and fellow feeling for one another have evaporated from us, and in their stead, selfishness, greed and avarice. People and institutions our society has depended upon since ages to show love to the young ones and guide them into the future have lost their sense of directions and have become stumbling blocks in the way of children.
Recent highhandedness by some teachers and school authorities in this country had shown the level of insensitivity some adults were exhibiting towards the young ones. Young girls being prevented from writing crucial exams which will shape their future merely because they have overgrown hair requires a psychiatric examination of those who took that decision just as much as the teacher who prevented a student from attending to nature’s call during an examination period. Pastors are attributing every human failures and challenges of the Ghanaian to the devil so people pray all night and sleep all day in the hope that their problems would be solved overnight instead of thinking and working.
There are murderers on our roads calling themselves drivers, yet we find our security agencies on the roads everyday supervising needless carnage on a daily basis. People who have monies to invest are doing so with callous disregard for the safety and lives of Ghanaians. The proliferation of Liquified and Petroleum Gas and Petrol Filling stations in residential areas with the active connivance of officialdom to the detriment of the safety and security of our citizenry only becomes a problem when there is an accident and lives are lost. We suddenly jolt into the realization that the facility is wrongly sited. We need psychiatric attention.
As individuals, we ignore building regulations and build in water courses while those paid to ensure that the right things are done simply look the other way for whatever reason. When there is flooding and the lawless residents are affected, two things happen. They call on government whose rules and regulations were disregarded with impunity to come to their aid while government officials whose job it was to ensure that those buildings were not put up in the first place quickly move in there and sympathize with the law breakers. Which of the two groups outsmarts the other in insanity?
The general indifference of the populace towards activities of some other individuals and groups in our society add to our woes on a daily basis. Some charlatans parading themselves as men and women of God who exhibit high sounding noise making public address systems in plying their trade are a great nuisance to the health and comfort of the public and yet we do not have the courage to stop this. At the lorry stations, in public transport buses, these noise makers parading themselves as men and women of God are such a worry to the nation but we seem helpless even though we are all uncomfortable.
We are endangering our health every passing second through our stupid and senseless ways of life. We create filth and live in them; it does not seem to be much difference between majority of us and the swine in this 21st century. Our actions and inactions, as far as sanitation practices are concerned, are killing us every day yet our behavior and attitudes compound the problems instead of alleviating them. The law enforcement institutions look on sheepishly when the nation suffers. Then when lives are lost, government organizes mock clean up campaigns in regional capitals and in their warped minds they think the insanitary conditions are over. They need psychiatric attention.
This country is the worst country in the world today in the area of corruption. People in government see looting and thievery as a way of life in the governance process and do not blink when they are confronted with evidence of thievery of public funds. The President appoints people to work for this country; they blatantly steal public monies and all that the President does is to shield them with the powerful tentacles of the state without a blush. In other jurisdictions, such public officers would be serving long prison terms or hanged. Having encouraged such wanton dissipation of public funds, we rush to countries which protect their resources by punishing criminals who steal monies they have strenuously worked for and guarded. Leadership requires serious psychiatric examination.
Government is taking everybody for a ride, workers’ contributions towards their future cannot be accounted for, huge sums of monies borrowed cannot be accounted for, the nation’s currency is the weakest in the world even though we are supposed to be in serene times, electricity has become a luxury in the 21st century, health services are endangered as hospitals and other health facilities operate with candles. The President keeps telling the nation things he fails to fulfill and we believe him. We all need psychiatric attention. I simply take solace and succor in my mahogany bitters, three tots for today.
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