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| John Atta Mills (right), president of Ghana, and US president Barack Obama walk together upon arrival at the Presidential Castle in Accra, Ghana |
ACCRA: US President Barack Obama received a jubilant welcome in Ghana as he began his first official trip to sub-Saharan Africa where he will present his vision on good governance on Saturday.
Thousands of people lined the streets Accra late Friday to catch a glimpse of the first black US president, the son of an African immigrant, after he arrived from a G8 summit in Italy.
Obama, his wife and their two daughters were welcomed at Kotoka international airport in the oceanside capital by Ghana’s President John Atta-Mills to traditional Ashante drumming, ululating and dances.
Obama, who will address parliament Saturday, said before the trip that he had chosen Ghana as his first trip to sub-Saharan Africa because it was an example of a “functioning democracy” in the conflict-scarred continent.
During his 24-hour visit, he is expected to push his vision on good governance and economic development for Africa, hours after securing a 20 billion dollar fund to feed the world’s hungry at the G8 summit.
The US leader will hold talks during a breakfast with his Atta-Mills, who came to power in January after a cliffhanger election, and then visit a malaria hospital receiving US assistance.
Along with his wife Michelle—a descendant of African slaves—he is also scheduled to tour Cape Coast Castle, formerly one of the continent’s main outposts from where slaves were shipped out to the Americas.
Ghana’s media was awash with articles, advertisements and poems paying tribute to Obama.
The Saturday morning newspapers featured pictures of Obama and his family arriving in Accra, while the main state-run Daily Graphic ran the headline “Welcome Home Obama”.
The Mirror published a poem about Obama and Atta-Mills titled “twins of the same mother”.
Obama’s choice of the former British colony on the west coast of Africa was based on Ghana’s record of democracy and stability in recent years.
Last year’s elections were Ghana’s fifth since a return to multi-party democracy in 1992 and marked the second time power changed hands alternately.
The first time power swapped hands peacefully was in 2000, when former military leader turned democratic ruler Jerry Rawlings handed over to John Kufuor after an eight-year stint as elected president.
“Part of the reason that we’re travelling to Ghana is because you’ve got there a functioning democracy, a president who’s serious about reducing corruption, and you’ve seen significant economic growth,” Obama said just before leaving for Accra.
“So I don’t want to overly generalise it, but I do want to make the broader point that a government that is stable, that is not engaging in tribal conflicts, that can give people confidence and security that their work will be rewarded.”
Obama, whose father was a Kenyan immigrant, also underscored the need for good governance on the world’s poorest continent.
“If you talk to people on the ground in Africa, certainly in Kenya, they will say that part of the issue here is the institutions aren’t working for ordinary people,” he said.
“And so governance is a vital concern that has to be addressed.”
Authorities in Cape Coast, a town 160 kilometres (100 miles) west of Accra, banned all funerals this weekend for the visit.
Ghana’s central regional minister Ama Benyiwaa Doe told AFP: “The dead can be buried later, but Obama is here for once and we must pay all attention to him.”
Bookshops in Accra were stocked with piles of Obama’s “The Audacity of Hope” book. And larger-than-life posters of Obama and Atta-Mills with the slogan “partnership for change” and “akwaaba” (welcome in the local language) were omnipresent.
Obama is the third consecutive US leader in under a decade to travel to Ghana, which was the first black African country to break free from its colonial shackles in 1957.
