Author: Gilbert Arhinful Aidoo, Thomas Prehi Botchway
Site of publication: UCC Law Journal
Type of publication: Article
Date of publication: December 2021
The extant literature shows that religion in Ghana has grown, and it has had both beneficial and detrimental effects on civic engagements in the country. The role religion plays in civic engagements and politics in particular dates back to colonialism. During the colonial period, religious groups played an important role in the struggle for independence by joining forces with other civil society groups to embark on civil disobedience for the country’s demands for self-governance. It serves as one of the unifying social platforms in Ghana since it is believed to transcend political affiliations and ethnic divides. Religion therefore serves as a neutral platform for citizens to engage in discussions of issues of national importance without the usual political, ethnic, gender, and social class biases.
Religion continues to play an important role in civic engagements in the country. During multiparty elections, both religious leaders and politicians use the various religious platforms to engage the citizenry in several ways. For the religious leaders, mostly, their churches, and mosques become the most important platforms to appeal to political leaders and parties as well as the youth to desist from anything that potentially can put the country aflame.
Furthermore, religious calculations also largely influence how parties select their candidates and running mates. While the NDC (National Democratic Congress) is not much bothered about balancing religion in terms of selection of their candidates and running mates, since 2000, religious calculations have largely informed the NPP’s (National Patriotic Party) choice of Christian presidential candidates, and Muslim running mates. The main motive is to appeal to both Christians and Muslims across the country to vote for their party. For example, in both the 2000 and 2004 elections, NPP had J. A. Kufuor as the Presidential candidate and Alhaji Aliu Mahama as the running mate. Again, since 2008 (2008, 2012; 2016 and 2020), Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo, a Christian has led the NPP as its candidate, with Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, a Muslim as his running mate. The motive is largely to balance religious representation among the two major religions in order to appeal to both religious sects for their support as against their main opponents.
Even though the Political Parties Act, 2000 and the 1992 Constitution frown on ethnic affiliations in political parties’ formation or ethnicization of political parties, ethnicity is an important social factor that continues to influence the socio-political and economic decisions of many Ghanaians. Ethnicity has and continues to significantly influence multiparty democratic elections and governance in Ghana. A close analysis of voting patterns in Ghana since 1992 showed that the electors have voted on ethnic lines for a particular political party. Political rivalry with ethnic undertones has also become part of Ghana’s body politics under its 30-year fourth democratic experiment. It is an open secret that Ghana’s two dominant political traditions in the Fourth Republic are rooted in ethnic affiliations.
In the 2020 election, the NPP won with almost 6.79 million (51.59%) of the valid votes cast; with the NDC polling 6.17 million (47.36%) of valid votes cast to come second. Interestingly, the NDC won a majority in eight of the 16 regions, and performed massively well in its traditional electoral World Bank, Volta Region (84.8%). It also did impressively well in Upper West (67.4%), Oti (63.3%) and Savanna (63%) regions. Whiles the NPP won majority in seven of the 16 regions: It unsurprisingly performed well in Ashanti (71.6%), and Eastern (60.5%) regions – its traditional support-base but did abysmally in Volta region (14.1%).Generally, it must however be noted, unlike the NDC, the NPP performed comparatively poorly in the 2020 elections in almost all 16 regions vis-à-vis the 2016 results.
Nonetheless, in Ghana, deep-rooted Ashanti-Ewe cleavages have hardly presented a dire threat to Ghanaian body politics. This can be attributed to some of the following factors. First, the Akan group is not monolithic. The Akans are highly fragmented, and Ashantis have not been able to mobilize the rest of the Akan sub-groups to support the NPP. In other words, the Akan group may be one linguistic and cultural group, but it does not behave as a cohesive political unit.
More importantly, although regional patterns of voting could therefore contain hidden ethnic dimensions, the trajectory of electoral politics in Ghana as depicted above shows that, even though ethnicity (and religion) are important, it is nevertheless not the sole variable that determines the outcome of elections in Ghana.
Moreover, while there have been some ethnic clashes and limited religious sentiments regarding Ghana’s electoral politics, largely, the situation has been well-managed to avoid any intractable civil war or ethnic/religious conflicts that may destabilize Ghana’s democracy, as has been the case in many African countries. However, if the political patronage of these two factors is not properly checked, religion and ethnicity can plunge the county into serious flames, or full-blown conflict.
Therefore, the following recommendations are suggested to improve Ghana’s electoral politics under the current three decades old Fourth Republican democratic dispensation. Firstly, religious leaders should continue to play an active role in ensuring peaceful and decorous campaigns. They must avoid inciting supporters against, or in favor of any politician, or political party. The current trend of spiritual forecast of election results and political spiritual ‘fatherism’ by some known self-acclaimed prophets must cease. Secondly, political leaders should also avoid inciting ethnic groups against one another. The respective ethnic groups’ leadership and their various youth groups must avoid inciting any group or party against the other.
The youth groups should desist from engaging in any violent activism for any political party or politician. They should rather channel their energies towards self-development and engage in industrious ventures. Finally, the various social and political institutions such as chieftaincy, religious sects and their respective mouthpieces or groups, the media, and National Commission for Civic Education, among others should endeavor to educate their members and the general population to engage in circumspection political activism and avoid any inflammatory commentary and activities.