citizens of the new state of ghana gather for the celebration marking their day of freedom from colonialism what was once the gold coast of british colony now becomes an independent commonwealth vice president and mrs nixon represent the united states at the three-day festivities native dances and games mark an event of historic importance since ghana becomes the first negro colony in africa to gain its freedom premier qualm necroma catch with representative adam clayton powell of the u.s as ghana's new army passes in review before the american educated premier and deputy secretary ralph bunch of the united nations another feature of the occasion is a beauty contest in which the fairest of the land compete and here is miss ghana herself [Applause] [Music] first queen of a brand new republic long before the likes of thomas sankara robert mugabe and nelson mandela would burst onto the international scene as the faces of anti-imperialism in africa one man stood head and shoulders above his peers as the leading political voice and the very embodiment of africa's struggle against colonialism ghana's first president dr kwame unkrumah took the world by storm as he led his nation to become the first black african nation to gain independence from the european powers but just as unkuruma's revolutionary leadership in ghana would trigger a wave of independence movements all across sub-saharan africa his gradual descent into authoritarianism and his sudden overthrow would also become a familiar story across many of africa's newly independent states this is the story of how dr kwame akuma went from being ghana's messiah and faultless hero to a political pariah whose ultimate demise would lead to wild celebrations on the streets by the very same people that had once loved and adored him at his headquarters at christian brook castle a 17th century slaving fort from where british governors had ruled the crown colony of the gold coast for over 50 years sir charles arden clock woke up on the morning of the 9th of february 1951 facing the most difficult decision of his career his problems centered around a 41 year old prisoner who had been held at james fort in accra on a three-year sentence for subversionary activities in the eyes of the colonial authorities this prisoner was a dangerous troublemaker who even while in chains was a serious threat to the stability of the colony according to official reports the man kwame nkrumah was a thoroughgoing communist and in unofficial communications was even described by governor arden clark as the local hitler you see prior to incrima's arrest the british officials had drawn up a carefully constructed plan for the colonies slow and steady transition into full independence under this plan the gold coast was to have what the british called a semi-responsible government and for the first time in the country's history there would be a general election to elect a new national assembly and executive council composed of mainly african representatives and in putting together this plan the british officials had collaborated with an elite group of gold coast lawyers businessmen and academics who had long been calling for the reforms referred to by the british as men of property and standing this group of gold coast elites had formed the nation's first major political party in 1947 known as the united gold course convention and their campaign slogan was self-government in the shortest possible time their leader dr joseph bocce dankwa was highly respected by the british and many within the emerging gold coast political elite a bona fide intellectual jb dankwa had studied law in the uk and was a qualified barrister called to the prestigious london inner temple spearheading the earliest push for ghana's independence dankwa personally prepared the first draft of his nation's new constitution and also suggested that the new nation be called ghana in honor of the 13th century empire of ghana located in modern day mali looking to spread their message to the masses and build popular support for their push for independence danko and his ugcc colleagues decided that they needed to hire a full-time organizer to help spread their message and galvanize the public it was here that an unknown activist named kwame nkuma was recommended to them unkuruma at the time had been out of the country for 12 years pursuing his studies in the u.s and england and although he was neither rich nor well-connected he was politically ambitious highly motivated and hungry for change while in the us he had earned degrees in economics sociology and philosophy and although he had moved to london in pursuit of a law degree he got completely distracted by activism as he befriended a number of prominent british communists with whom he regularly participated in anti-colonial protests but while his activism was food for the soul it wasn't putting food on the table the younger groomer often found himself short of funds and was in desperate need for a stable source of income and so when offered the job by danqua's united gold coast convention he grabbed the opportunity with both hands and moved back to the gold coast unkuruma dankwa and the other founding members of the ugcc ebenezer akoa j edward akufo emmanuel obitsu billamte and william of foreata would all be collectively known in ghanaian political folklore as the big six [Music] within less than two years nkrumah had fallen out with the other members of the big six while danko and co were happy to cooperate with the colonial government's proposal for a slow and steady transition of power unkuruma began calling for independence immediately unkuruma subsequently broke away from the ugcc and started his own party known as the convention people's party unlike the prim proper and gentlemanly ugcc which was well supported by the colony's economic and cultural elites unkuruma cpp was a radical political machine that focused on stirring up the emotions of the masses with revolutionary songs catchy slogans and provocative posters the cpp also set up media outlets which would work day and night to raise anti-colonial sentiment in the public by vilifying the colonial authorities and labeling the ugcc as colonial collaborators in opposition to the ugcc slogan of self-government in the shortest possible time one criminal cpp would call for self-government now and would declare that the draft constitution prepared by jb dankwa was bogus and fraudulent traveling all around the country and delivering fiery speeches oncrumor gained a massive following by promising civil servants office clerks petty traders construction workers and primary school teachers that all of the grievances and hardships would disappear once colonel rule had been brought to an end many of his supporters would grow to see him as a literal messiah sent from the heavens with the sole purpose of freeing them from the shackles of colonial oppression and ushering in a bright new dawn of peace and prosperity for all embracing the halo that had been placed on his head by the masses unkuruma would famously encourage his supporters to seek first the political kingdom and all else would follow and so even when the colonial government began readying the colony for his first elections in 1951 unkuruma maintained that the british plan for a slow and steady transition to independence was nothing more than a massive scam taking matters into their own hands unkuruma and his party members mobilized a mass disturbance with strikes boycotts and mass demonstrations which were intended to force the british to agree to immediate self-government following the subsequent outbreak of civil unrest the governor charles arden clark declared a state of emergency and ordered the arrest of nkrumah and his associates onkruma was subsequently convicted on three charges of incitement and sedition and sentenced to three consecutive prison terms of one year each but far from stopping the cpp on kruma's arrest would energize his base even more as his status as a true revolutionary had now been confirmed by the suffering he was enduring for his beliefs as the general election scheduled for february 1951 june era early indications suggested that the cpp would gain a majority of the seats and while in his prison cell unkuruma discovered a legal loophole that allowed any prisoner sentenced to a term of imprisonment not exceeding one year to contest for elections as his three-year sentence was actually composed of three separate terms of one year each onkrumah announced that he would be running for office from his prison cell news of vancruma's participation in the elections would trigger a great wave of enthusiasm which would see increment supporters come out to vote for the cpp on mass as expected unkuruma cpp won the election in a landslide victory leaving the colonial governor arden clark with a serious dilemma on the morning of the 9th of february 1951 although nkrumah still had three years of unspent prison time on his sentence the new reality was that he had just been elected to high office in a landslide victory by his own people after weighing the pros and cons the choice became crystal clear without unchroma's release there would likely have been a mass uprising which the colonial authorities certainly could not afford to have to deal with and so after 14 months in prison kwame nkuma was released on the 12th of february 1951 to a massive reception from his supporters within the space of two days unkuruma had gone from convict to prime minister a development that will send shockwaves all around colonial africa you see the gold coast had for many years been seen as britain's most precious possession in africa its immense natural wealth and human capital was virtually unrivalled in sub-saharan africa as the world's leading producer of cocoa for over 40 years the gold coast had a large and prosperous farming community its education system was also the most advanced in colonial africa and it boasted of the largest proportion of educated and skilled workers in any african colony ethnically the country was also unusually homogeneous and free from ethnic and religious tensions with over half of the population being of akan origin the vast majority of which were christian converts the fact that the british were now showing signs of letting go of this most prized possession drew the attention of anti-colonial activists from all around the world as the first major sign of the end of colonialism in africa with his new position unkuruma immediately got to work by pushing a motion in the colony's new parliament for full self-government without delay and although the british government had strong objections to the pace of change it eventually agreed on groomers demands and agreed to the creation of a new constitution providing for full internal self-government under the control of an all-african cabinet with this historic victory unkuruma had etched his name into the history books and would ascend to demigod status within his party and the country at large party members would begin comparing him to the biblical moses who had been sent to lead his people towards the promised land of independence and local newspapers would bestow on him grandiose titles like man of destiny star of africa the iron boy the great leader of street boys and the deliverer of ghana his name would even be inserted into the lyrics of methodist hymns and special prayers will be written for him from morning till night his home was constantly visited by people seeking help on anything from marital disputes to financial assistance sickness and even infertility but no matter how busy he was he always tried to find time for them and his entire life would be devoted to his work and his politics a pure introvert who neither smoked nor drank his only real indulgence would be his love for classical and high life music after a few more rocky years of negotiations officially won independence from great britain and thus the nation of ghana was born on the 6th of march 1957 ghana's independence celebrations would be the most globally acclaimed african event of its time as delegates from 56 countries arrived on african soil to share in ghana's joy and there was certainly a lot to celebrate as of independence unkurumas ghana was one of the richest tropical countries in the world with an efficient civil service an impartial judiciary and a growing middle class its parliament was filled with arguably the most competent politicians in africa and although the prime minister himself had only six years experience in government he was highly respected for his vision and had the backing of his entire country as the number one producer of cocoa in the world ghana had huge foreign currency reserves which he had built during the 1950s coco boom and also had large reserves of gold timber and bauxite oncrumer's vision however would be much larger than just the liberation of his beloved ghana his life's mission was to oversee the creation of a borderless african superstate in which all the french british spanish and portuguese colonies would break free from colonial control and unite under a single pan-african government and despite the vast religious cultural and ethnic differences of the various nations of africa unkuruma did not see his pan-african goals as some distant objective to be gradually achieved over the course of several generations instead he was fully convinced that with the right level of political will and dedication his grand vision could be achieved within his own lifetime ghana's capital accra was to become a center of african liberation from which nationalist leaders from all across colonial africa could come to draw support in their various independent struggles in his independence day address unkuruma would proclaim in front of large crowds that ghana's independence was meaningless if it wasn't linked up with the total liberation of the african continent and in 1958 a meeting of some 300 representatives from all across africa for the all african people's conference some of a few big names in attendance were tanzania's julia singieri zimbabwes joshua oncomo zambia's kenneth kaunder hastings bander of malawi and patrice lumumba of congo the event was hugely successful and in the subsequent years many of the attendees went on to successfully push for the independence of their respective countries [Music] after having successfully overthrown british rule in ghana and paved the way to independence for many other african countries began to see himself playing an even bigger role on the world stage with some reports suggesting that he harboured ambitions to become the president of the entire continent domestically his plan was to transform ghana into africa's leading industrial power and a model socialist society which other african states would seek to emulate [Music] his long-term vision was to lead the nations of africa to become a major world power which was on par with the united states and the soviet union and sure enough the early years of his government were very promising indeed as ghana's forestry fishing and cattle industries significantly expanded and the production of the nation's main export of cocoa increased by more than double and working in collaboration with an american company his government also began the construction of a dam on the volta river which upon completion would provide water for agricultural irrigation and provide electricity for nearby factories and neighboring countries its government also heavily invested in nationwide projects for the construction of free schools universities and hospitals which would further solidify his image as a true man of the people [Music] blending together ideas drawn from marx lenin and mao unkuruma created a state ideology which he called unchromaism he also established an ideological institute where he employed a number of foreign socialist thinkers to work on developing elaborate political theories and policies based on his socialist philosophy and after initially struggling to clearly define what uncriminalism was and how it was any different from other marxist socialist ideas the kwame nkrumah ideological institute eventually concluded that uncriminalism was an ideology for the new africa independent and absolutely free from imperialism organized on a continental scale founded upon the conception of one in united africa drawing a strength from modern science and technology and from the traditional african belief that the free development of each is conditioned by the free development of all but despite the elaborate theoretical framework of chromism its real-world application would ultimately fail to produce the socialist paradise envisioned by nkrumah and its political [Music] scientists in its bid to rapidly transform ghana into an industrial powerhouse when cruma's government set out to execute a long list of major infrastructure projects from shipping ports to roads dams universities and manufacturing plants everything was to be built from scratch and built fast the problem however was that not many local companies could actually bring these projects to life and so rather ironically most of the contracts for these major projects needed to be advertised to the very same foreign companies that were regularly denounced by leading members of the cpp to make matters worse the award of these contracts was quickly hijacked by corrupt officials and many key members of nkrumah's government would grow filthy rich by charging bribes for foreign companies and allowing them to inflate the costs of government projects in exchange for kickbacks and other advantages and slowly but surely an orwellian animal farm society began to emerge as ghana's post-independence political elites began exploiting the new nation in much the same way as their colonial predecessors pursuing his goal to make ghana a model socialist society unkuruma publicly declared that this government would work towards a complete ownership of the economy by this date and in pursuit of this goal he would set up a long list of government ministries and state-owned enterprises and thanks to this very large and powerful government apparatus pretty much every aspect of ghanaian life was placed under the direct or indirect control of one government minister or the other and with their extensive powers many of unchroma's ministers began treating the resources under their control as their own private property and a culture of bullying bribery and embezzlement would spread from the top to the bottom of ghanaian society from job applications to business licenses and even the award of university scholarships if you needed to get anything done you either had to know someone in power or pay someone a bribe despite publicly preaching about socialist virtues like solidarity and collective struggle many of uncumber's ministers began flaunting their wealth and living very lavish lifestyles when questioned about why his wife chose to import a 3 000 pound gold-plated bed from london cabinet's minister crobo educate would respond saying socialism doesn't mean that if you've made a lot of money you can't keep it edusay would later confess to owning 14 houses a luxurious beachfront property a long lease on a london flat several expensive cars and six different bank accounts following the sudden expansion of his own personal net worth even nkrumah himself would be accused of collecting bribes through a special company known as the national development corporation which was set up specifically to collect a fee of 10 to 15 on the award of every government contract but while the growth of corruption in his government would slowly begin to eat at his reputation as a man of the people it would be his steady descent into authoritarianism that would be the defining blight on crimean crimea's legacy [Music] within just one year of gaining independence unkuruma's government passed the preventative detention act of 1958 which effectively allowed his government to detain anyone without trial for up to five years in theory this power was to be used very sparingly and only in times of extreme emergency in practice however um groomers government would routinely use this power to silence critics and opposition voices in 1958 38 people were detained under the act while in 1961 the figure rose to 311 in 1963 586 people were held and in the year 1965 alone some 1 200 people were detained under the act amongst one of the many prominent victims was dr jb dankwa the very same man that had employed on kumar to work for the ugcc on his return from london after spending the last year of his life in solitary confinement a sick and disheartened jb dankwa died of a heart attack as you can imagine it wasn't long before a growing coalition of opposition voices began to spring up all around the country but nevertheless virtually every action taken by nkrumah was met with endless praise by the state's controlled media and self-preserving politicians despite jailing over 300 people without trial in 1961 a local newspaper would boldly proclaim when our history is recorded the man kwame nkrumah will be written off as the liberator the messiah the christ of our day whose great love for mankind wrought changes in ghana in africa and in the world at large and an official portrait of dr kwameonkumar published the very same year would read to millions of people living both inside and outside of the continent of africa kwame nkrumah is africa and africa is kwame nkrumah when the question was asked what is going to happen to africa it is to one man that everyone looked for the answer kwame nkrumah to the imperialists and colonialists his name is a curse on their lips to the settlers his name is a warning that the good old days at the expense of the african are coming to an end to african suffering under foreign domination his name is a breath of hope and means freedom brotherhood and racial equality to us his people kwame nkrumah is our father our teacher our brother our friend indeed our very lives for without him we would no doubt have existed but we would not have lived there would have been no hope of a cure for our sick souls no taste of glorious victory after a lifetime of suffering what we owe is even greater than the air we breathe for he made us as surely as he has made ghana [Music] [Music] treating him more like a king than an elected public servant his image was plastered all around the country his face was on banknotes and postage stamps and his statues stood outside his nation's parliament his birthday was a public holiday and his photographs could be found in offices shops and even in people's homes but behind the facade the coalition of opposition voices was growing and kwame nkrumah knew it he began to distrust everyone around him and decided that the best way to protect himself was to consolidate power even further [Music] with the passing of a new constitution in 1960 ghana had become a republic and unkuruma had become the country's first president however this was not just any kind of presidency according to ghana's new constitution the president had the power to rule by decree as he could reject any decisions by the parliament and dismiss or appoint key members of the civil service armed forces and even the judiciary with these new powers unkuruma will tighten his grip on ghana state's controlled media and relentlessly pursue his critics and opponents using the preventative detention act in 1961 it became a criminal offence for anyone to show disrespect to the person and dignity of the head of state and the president's party was declared superior to the civil service the trade unions farmers organizations and all youth groups unkuruma also set off special courts to deal with political offences with hand-picked judges whose decisions were not subject to any right of appeal an assassination attempt on his life in 1962 made unkuruma even more suspicious of his inner circle and convinced that his own party members were responsible he ordered the arrest of three of his ministers the three men were tried on charges of conspiracy before a special court and after the chief justice declared them not guilty unkuruma dismissed the judge passed a new law through parliament which enabled him to set aside the verdict and at the second trial with the judge he had picked all three men were found guilty and sentenced to death although nkrumah subsequently reduced their sentences to life imprisonment in 1964 a second assassination attempt was made on okuma's life by a member of the police force suspecting that the entire police service at large was involved unkuruma ordered the police to be disarmed sacked several officers and detained the police commissioner and his deputy adding even more fuel to the fire the ghanaian public also began to lose faith in oklahoma's government as a lot of the initial economic progress that was made slowly began to be reversed thanks to its long list of costly projects which were made even more expensive thanks to the cultural corruption within the government on chroma's administration soon found itself with a serious debt problem and even as the debt continued to grow the government continued to commission project after project from tyre factories to steel works mining ventures and ship dockyards no project was too expensive and no vision was too unrealistic by the year 1963 garner's debt had risen to 349 million pounds which in today's money would amount to over 6 billion pounds unkuruma's agricultural policies would also cause many of his rural supporters to turn against him the ghana coco board which was the sole buyer of coco in the country began paying less and less the peasant farmers for the same amount of produce deciding that enough was enough the farmers revolted and began selling cocoa on the black market and refused to plant more trees meanwhile the state-run cocoa farms on the other hand which were controlled by cpp party members were so inefficient that despite their superior equipment they only produce one-fifth of the total amount of cocoa that was produced by ghana's population of small-scale peasant farmers and so from being one of the richest countries in africa as at the time of his independence in 1957 unkromos garner was basically bankrupt by 1965. as a huge government spending spree of over 430 million pounds or 7.6 billion pounds in today's money had left the nation with huge unpayable debts and the many government-run factories and companies that had received this investment ultimately failed to make enough money to pay back the loans due to incompetence mismanagement and corruption beset by rising prices higher taxes and food shortages the general population was becoming increasingly disgruntled as the standard of living for unskilled workers in most towns and villages had fallen to the pre-independence levels of 1939 okruma's pan-african ambitions would also suffer an equally somber fate despite investing a great deal of energy and resources into trying to convince other newly independent african states to come together to form a united government unkuruma made very little progress as major african leaders such as nigeria staffer balua and president felix ufoed bonnie of the ivory coast were diametrically opposed to nkrumah's grand vision in addition to the disdain from criminal socialist philosophy the likes of baliwa and hufat boi simply did not believe that the vastly different peoples of the region could integrate as quickly and as smoothly as rokuma had envisioned and in the great battle between east and west unkuruma was very keen for african nations to build closer diplomatic ties with socialist nations such as the soviet union china and yugoslavia as opposed to the united states and his european allies in 1961 the president of yugoslavia joseph bros was invited for a state visit to ghana and after officially establishing diplomatic ties with the people's republic of china unkuruma even changed his dressing from the classic western suit and thai to the chinese zhengchang suit which was made popular by china's chairman mao bonkruma's own apologetic preference for greater african alignment with the eastern powers would be a major cause for this agreement with the political elites in other english-speaking african countries such as nigeria and liberia who prefer to maintain relations with the uk and u.s as well as the vast majority of the former french colonies who prefer to maintain their alliances with france this ideological divide would ultimately prove to be one of the biggest barriers standing in the way of vancouver's dream of a united african super state at a conference of african leaders in 1963 to establish the organization of african unity unkuruma proposed a formal declaration that all african leaders present would commit to the establishment of a union of african states but to his great disappointment not a single attendee provided a declaration unkuruma was subsequently get into a heated debate with julos ingerie of tanzania who at the time was making plans for the creation of an east african super state known as the east african federation unkuruma also openly accused the leaders of the french-speaking african countries of being nothing more than puppets of french neo-colonialism as a result the political elites in countries like togo ivory coast cameroon burkina faso and niger would all begin to hold on kumai contempt and begin working against his pan-african project whatever determined to make his pan african dream a reality when kuma allegedly began sponsoring opposition groups in neighboring countries in the hope of overthrowing governments that oppose its pan-african ambitions after ghanaian agents were implicated in an assassination attempt on togo's president sylvanas olympio seven african leaders threatened to break off diplomatic ties with ghana in 1965 a political dissident who had been trained in ghana attempted to assassinate president hamani diori of niger responding to accusations and criticisms of his government support for this subversionary action unkuruma simply responded that there will be no need for subversion if the government of nijei would support the creation of a pan-african government now with the growing list of both international and domestic enemies unkuruma moved to protect himself by tightening his grip on power even further in 1964 unkuruma decided to turn garner into a one-party state and upgrade his office from president to president for life unkuruma's proposals were presented to the ghanaian people in a referendum and according to the official figures a bra raising 99.9 of the electorate voted in favor of the government's proposals as president for life unkuruma brought even more government functions under his direct control from higher education to foreign trade defense and even law making as a side project he also built his very own private zoo where he kept amongst other things a lion he received from emperor haile selassie of ethiopia a hippo from president tubman of liberia and a boar constrictor which was sent by fidel castro of cuba ever committed to making his dream of a united african government a reality unkuruma commissioned the construction of job 600 an office complex which was purpose built for the 1965 organization of african unity conference at the total cost of 10 million pounds which in today's money would amount to just over 165 million pounds despite the growing national debt failing state-owned factories needing raw materials public hospitals lacking medication and many ghanaians queuing for food in towns and villages across the nation unkuruma believed that the construction of this building was a top priority as it would one day serve as the government headquarters of africa's united government as usual ghana state-owned media held the construction of the building as another great achievement annokuma himself publicly boasted of the state-of-the-art building which had 60 self-contained luxury suites a banquet hall capable of seating 2000 guests and a beautiful water fountain display however the oau conference itself would be a complete disappointment by 1965 bonkuma's foreign policies had alienated so many other african governments that very few were actually willing to attend a group of 14 leaders led by president felix sufred bonnie of the ivory coast decided to boycott the event in retaliation from kruma support for opposition groups within the various countries [Music] only 13 heads of state attended the event and in the end when yokuma asked all the attendees to declare their commitment to the creation of the united african government not a single leader agreed to make a commitment unkuruma's popularity was now at an all-time low and shortly after this public humiliation their wheels were set in motion for his eventual demise by early 1966 the terrible state of the economy and the eye-watering levels of corruption and mismanagement that had embedded itself into every aspect of the government meant that unkuruma's only political allies were those who were directly on his payroll feeling increasingly paranoid after two assassination attempts on his life okuma began meddling with the one institution in ghana that was still powerful enough to stand up to him looking to prevent an army revolt unkuruma began trying to subjugate the ghanaian army just as he had done with other institutions cpp spies would allegedly be sent to infiltrate the army looking to identify potential traitors congruent also demoted a number of high-ranking officials restructured the army and set up a special presidential guard regiment devoted to his personal protection with the government's popularity at an all-time low and their own personal interests at stake a coalition of disgruntled army officers plotted and successfully overthrew on cruma's government while he was away on a diplomatic trip on the 24th of february 1966 [Music] [Applause] india's prime minister mrs indira gandhi meets president nakruma of ghana that is he was president at the moment these pictures were taken two days later he was overthrown in a coup by military forces nakuma was on his way to peak king to end the war in vietnam he said it was on the day after his arrival in the red chinese capital that he heard the sad news he was out of a job ghana had been one of the first african nations to gain independence but her days of democracy were short-lived when nakuma elected himself for life jailed all his foes and began a despotic rule [Music] in the days following the coup the streets of major cities like akran komasi were filled with rejoicing crowds and the towering statue of kwame nkrumah that had stood outside of his country's parliament was knocked down and stamped on by the crowd [Music] oh [Music] so [Music] uh [Music] how many people do you know of who died in detention well at the time i went i didn't know the real number but later on when i was at the the period that was there i think about some say between 10 to 15 people died at the time i was there how were you treated here before i was sent to prison there i was intense and in were you in chains and handcuffs all the time yeah persistent goodness yes how did you feel when you learned you were going to be let out very happy sir how long were you in detention i've been internship for nearly five years now how did they treat you well i was not so badly treated but the lock-ups were too much for us we were kept in custody for about three months without giving any air what about the food in general treatment food is generally poor very very poor and had caused a lot of illness to us to many of us what did you feel when you heard you were being allowed out i felt that probably the army might have taken part otherwise the wicked government would not permit anybody to be released because we were told that we remain in detention for the rest of our lives kwame nkrumah would never see his homeland ever again having received notice of his overthrow he fled to the republic of guinea where he was appointed honorary co-president by fellow socialist and pan-africanist president ahmed sekou turi from his new base in guinea unkuruma would dedicate the remaining six years of his life to publishing various books and essays centered around his vision for a united african government in a memoir he published three years after his overthrow unkuruma alleged that the cia and other western intelligence agencies acting in collusion with the coup plotters were the real driving forces behind his overthrow [Music] and although the images of thousands of ghanaians celebrating in the streets tell a different story it is still widely believed by many of vancruma's contemporary supporters that the overthrow was primarily due to foreign interference as opposed to the domestic unpopularity of from chroma's government [Music] and so even nearly five decades after his death in 1972 unkuruma's legacy remains a hot topic of debate between his contemporary supporters who admire him for his pan-african vision and socialist philosophies and his many detractors often with first-hand experience who continued to condemn him for his authoritarianism and the eye-watering levels of corruption and mismanagement that took hold of ghanaian society during his reign once again it's kb tower for new africa if you've enjoyed this video and would like to see more content like this then please like and share this video and also consider supporting us on patreon at patreon.com new africa thanks again for your support and until next time [Music] you