BY PETER KOMLA DJITEY

Former Ghanaian president Jerry Rawlings who died on November 12 in Accra at the age of 73 after an undisclosed, short illness, was laid to rest several hours ago today, Wednesday, with the full honors befitting the legendary, charismatic leader who has left indelible marks on one of Sub-Saharan Africa’s most important nations.

The four-day commemorations got underway last Sunday with a service at the Holy Cathedral, followed by three days of mourning during which the former head of state’s body lay in state at the Accra International Conference Centre. Despite the authorities asking the public to watch the funeral on television in observance of the measures to avoid the spread of covid-19, hundreds of people streamed in to pay their respects to the late president. Then, earlier today, his casket was paraded through the main streets of the Ghanaian capital, followed by his burial at the military cemetery at Burma Camp, the headquarters of Ghana’s armed forces.

The funeral was attended by several West African officials, including President George Weah of Liberia, Sierra Leonean President Julius Maada Bio, the speaker of the Togolese parliament, Yawa Dzigbodi Tsegan, not to mention Nigeria’s foreign minister Geoffery Onyeama. The late president is survived by his wife, Nana Konadu Agyemang-Rawlings; his three daughters Zanetor Rawlings, Yaa Asantewaa Rawlings, and Amina Rawlings; and one son, Kimathi Rawlings.

The Godfather of modern-day Ghana’s democracy

Jerry John Rawlings, an Air Force officer turned politician who ruled Ghana for a total of 19 years, seized power via a coup in 1979, but soon thereafter relinquished it to a civilian rule. But not for too long, as he grabbed power again in December 1981 and kept it until 1992, the year he introduced multi-party elections that brought back democratic rule. He served two democratic four-year terms from 1993 to 2001. He however continued to significantly impact national politics after stepping down. The late president is unanimously credited with laying the foundation for democratic elections and peaceful transfer of power in a Ghana hitherto plagued with political instability and endemic corruption.

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In his eulogy, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo—who made no mystery of the “open animosity” between him and Rawlings—described the late president as “charismatic, energetic and fearless,” not without mentioning his “admirers and lifelong enemies.” Akufo-Addo also said: “ One thing we had in common is the commitment to public service,” praising the late president for making Ghana’s democracy “stable in our history for all his revolutionary antecedents.”

Rawlings is indeed loved by many Ghanaians, as much as he is loathed by others. The son of a Scottish father and a Ghanaian mother, the1969 graduate of the Ghanaian Air force is remembered by many as the brutal leader who initiated the execution of several Ghanaian former heads of state, army generals and Supreme Court judges in his drive to root out corruption from Ghanaian politics.

Speaking during the funeral, a spokesperson for the National Democratic Congress, the party founded by the late president to run for president in 1992, praised Rawlings as “a legend in Ghana’s history.” Hudu Yahaya described the late president as a man intolerant of corruption, and praised his commitment to promote the marginalized segments of society.