A broken chair is not discarded. It is fixed. A vehicle that breaks down along a journey is repaired. When a door breaks, a carpenter fixes it. When the systems of a nation are broken, however, who is responsible for fixing them?
A broken chair can be sat on. However, it poses great danger to the one who sits on it. Similarly, a broken system does not work as it should. It is like a ticking time bomb. One day will be its last.
A careful look at the systems of this nation points to one ugly truth ~ there is no single system that can be labeled as a perfectly working one. From sports to education, there is a yawning gap between what it is now and what it is supposed to be.
For as long as I can remember, BECE (Basic Education Certificate Examination) questions leak every year. If our teens have been taught to accept corruption at such a young age, we should not be disappointed the least at the caliber of adults our education system churns out.
For as long as I can remember, the lack of beds in our hospitals has killed more patients than malaria. Like a game of hide-and-seek, desperate people have to move their loved ones from one hospital to another in search of a nonexistent bed. By the time they find one, the sick would have given up the ghost. A sick health system needs healing first before it heals others.
For as long as I can remember, our security systems have become another appendage of politicians. Most recruitments and appointments are based on one’s political affiliation and not merit. “Who brought you?” is that question you need to answer to change your destiny. If you live in a country where your party card can open doors your certificate can only imagine, you should not expect much.
There is a cause to complain about every system. The stark difference between where we are as a people and where we ought to be is worth pondering over. If no single system in our beloved country can stand out as a model for all the others to emulate, we indeed have a lot of questions to ask ourselves.
Is this nation headed towards the right direction? Will posterity grow up into a nation that keeps nothing stable, not even our cedi? Will they grow up to fight battles of their ancestors when their contemporaries on other continents are fighting battles of their future?
Working systems do not fall from the skies. They are built intentionally. Wherever systems work, it is people who make them work. And when these systems work, everybody benefits. Nobody is left behind.
Recently, when reading about previous aircraft accidents that had happened in Ghana, I noticed an awful trend. There were no investigations or reports after most of them happened. We just left the bereaved to bury their dead… and moved on as though we had a magic wand that could prevent future accidents.
Was I surprised about this trend? Not at all. Many citizens perish day in and out on our roads, especially on the Kumasi highway. Are there investigations? Are there efforts to ensure these accidents do not repeat? Your guess is as good as mine. The system is awfully broken!
If even the remains of ministers were bundled up into cocoa sacks, you can imagine what you and me would be bundled into if we suffer a similar fate. We may be discarded like a piece of trash. When systems do not work, lives are not cherished. People perish needlessly. Every life that is lost only adds up to the statistics. Nothing more.
May the patriots who perished rest well. Unfortunately, they will not be the last because, as a people, we refuse to learn from our mistakes and life keeps punishing us bitterly. We will attribute every accident to the devil or God… and just move on. No meticulous investigation ~ only assumptions.
When such disasters happen, the media would rather consult prophets and spiritualists than experts in the said field. You see, we need a total re-engineering of our mindset. Our systems are only a product of our mindset. If this is how far we have been able to come with such an awkward mindset, imagine how far we can go if we have the right mindset.
Source: ameyawdebrah.com/
