Kwame Gyan Writes: Let's Change 'Chale'

I repeat, Rwanda is no hype! Rwanda is no hype! Some of you have seen it too. Tell them.

Whiles we have been talking plenty and having needless arguments, they have been growing. And remember they had a devastating war to deal with. After 61 years of absolute freedom and peace;

1. We still have no idea how to manage sanitation

2. Seeing beggars and hawkers on our streets feel like normal

3. When you are in a trotro and you protest whenever the driver jumps red, drives on the kerb, or uses unauthorised and dangerous roads, you seem to be the abnormal one

4. We have 10,000 people in charge of security yet we handle security and it's attendant matters like we are still in 1624.

5. We still build narrow, opened drains in 2018

6. We build roads and then need to patch them up after 4 months - there are probably more patching companies than road contractors in Ghana

7. Our motorcyclists feel they are exempt from traffic regulations - the traffic lights were not made for them.

8. In the name of mourning, a section of us can break every common sense and traffic regulation and drive in unauthorised convoys as fast as race cars - just to go bury someone who is in no hurry to go anywhere.

9. People are comfortable throwing rubbish out of moving vehicles. Worse, people get out of their homes and dump rubbish into the gutters in front of their homes and somehow will blame everyone but themselves for the rain water that gushes into their bedrooms during rainfall.

10. We will threaten government with votes for daring to stop a few selfish folks who want to degrade our land and pollute our waters in their quest to make money for themselves

11. We demand monies from politicians and office holders and somehow get surprised that they loot our monies to maintain the lifestyles that we have pushed them in to.

12. We find it ok to frustrate investors and business people using bogus, bureaucratic processes to forestall their intentions

But, we can grow out of this. We can be like Rwanda. Heck, we can be better than Rwanda. But we need to change. We need to change that psyche we have and our way of seeing things. We can't grow and change if we continue to do the same old things again and again.

Let's change chale.
That starts with us.
You. Me. Us. Together.