By Promise Adiele

It is not the anniversary of the death of former Ghanaian president and revolutionary leader Jerry John Rawlings. It is not even the anniversary of his birth date. He was born on the 22nd of June 1947 and died on the 12th  of November 2020. This is not June. This is not November. Yet, thoughts about him keep making forced but welcomed intrusions into the recesses of my subconscious mind. Initially, the thoughts of Valentine Strasser, former Sierra Leonean revolutionary leader and Thomas Sankara, former Burkina Faso revolutionary leader dominated my mind but somehow, the thoughts of Jerry John Rawlings occupied my thought processes, taking over proceedings. Jerry John Rawlings redefined the socio-political and economic climate of Ghana, a country that was making an unhindered journey to the abyss of existential ruination before Rawlings took over. His pan-African ethos sets him aside as a perfect definition of a true nationalist.

Given his messianic posturing and the enduring saviour status he acquired in Ghana and Africa, many people called him “Junior Jesus” an appellation adherents of the Christian faith termed as profane and blasphemous. To compare Jesus Christ to Jerry Rawlings is a misnomer. That is not my intention here. But given that Jesus Christ represents a concise metaphor for any saviour of humanity at any level, given the way Rawlings saved Ghana from the hands of political and economic demons, that comparison may not be far-fetched, at least on its face value. Any country starring at an economic nadir needs a Jerry Rawlings, nothing can be more axiomatic.