College of Humanities & Social Sciences

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    A REVIEW OF THE ELECTORAL PROCESS UNDER GHANA’S FOURTH REPUBLIC
    (KNUST., 2020-01-30) Gawu Delali A.
    Ghana’s democracy was disrupted by incessant coups d’état, and elected governments could not complete their terms until the inception of the Fourth Republic in 1992.1 The Fourth Republican Constitution of Ghana 1992 provides for multi-party democracy as a form of government and mandates that there should be elections every four years to choose a president and members of parliament. Chapter Seven of the Constitution established the Electoral Commission (EC) to conduct elections periodically through a laid-down process. There have been seven general elections under the Fourth Republic to elect presidents and members of parliament. 2 These have resulted in the alternation of power between the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and New Patriotic Party (NPP), the two main political divides in Ghana. 3 Consequently, Ghana has won the accolade of being a beacon of democracy in Africa.
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    Quasi-state of emergency: assessing the constitutionality of Ghana’s legislative response to Covid-19
    (KNUST., 2020-06-15) Addadzi-Koom, Maame Efua
    On 15 March 2020, the President of the Republic of Ghana addressed the nation on anti-coronavirus measures which took effect immediately. He directed the Attorney-General to submit an emergency legislation to Parliament and the Minister for Health to issue an immediate Executive Instrument to regulate the relevant measures. Five days later, Parliament passed the Imposition of Restrictions Act, 2020 (IRA) after a voice count in its favour. A few days, thereafter, the President issued an Executive Instrument (E.I. 64) pursuant to the IRA. The minority members of Parliament, some legal scholars and interested Ghanaians expressed their disapproval of the procedures leading to the enactment of the IRA as well as its nature, form and content. The contentions cover multiple constitutional and legal grounds including the procedural propriety of using a voice vote in Parliament for emergency legislation, the necessity of a new emergency legislation and the time limit for the new emergency legislation. Essentially, these issues point to assessing the overall constitutionality of the law-making procedures and legislative provisions of the IRA. This is the focus of this paper. The paper argues that the IRA stands unconstitutional from the very beginning of its intended existence. The paper concludes that while the IRA is currently operational, its continued existence is challengeable under the 1992 Con
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    Akan Religio-Cultural Thought and Environmental Management: The Case of the Atiwa District, Ghana
    (KNUST, 2018-11) Antwi, Joseph Kofi Rev
    There are a number of academic studies that suggest that conservational values embedded in religio-cultural thoughts could be used in collaboration with science in finding lasting solutions to the environmental problems. However, despite these abundant studies and advocacy, successive governments of Ghana have ignored these in environmental management strategies. Using the Atiwa district in the Eastern Region of Ghana, as a case study, this study explores the reasons why policy-decision makers have not factored the Akan religio-cultural thoughts into environmental management in Ghana. Three qualitative techniques were employed in this study: key-informant personal interviews, participant’s observation and focus-group discussion. Data from the fieldwork were analysed to discover relationships, facts and assumptions that addressed the objectives of the study using the ethnographic research analysis tool. The study reveals that Akan religio-cultural thought comprises primarily the thinking patterns, values, beliefs and practices of the indigenous people and expressed through myths, customs, traditions, proverbs, beliefs and practices, values and moral systems, and they continue to shape the life of the people, including their ecological knowledge. The study further shows that Akans express their environmental conservational potentials through indigenous resources such as the concept of Kraboa (Totems), Sasa-tumi (Spirits), Sacred groves, Gyedua (Trees), Asaase Yaa (Mother Earth), and others. The study notes that the people have been relying on these conservational strategies since time immemorial, long before the encounter with Westernisation. To be able to harness their conservational potentials today, it is proposed that the religio-cultural thoughts must be ennobled to serve as a guide to environmental managers in formulating new policies of conserving the environment not only in Atiwa, but other communities in Ghana.
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    Nana Yaa Asantewaa : dimensions épique et socio-culturelle d’une héroїne traditionnelle Asante.
    (KNUST, 2017-05) Mensah, Magdalene
    Nana Yaa Asantewaa – the epic and sociocultural dimensions of a traditional asante heroine, is the title of our dissertation. The research focuses on the heroism of Nana Yaa Asantewaa. Our analytical tool was Sociocritics. The problem was the ambiguity around the heroism of Nana Yaa Asantewaa. Our aim was to study the heroic role of Nana Yaa Asantewaa in the last resistance war against the English colonial administration; to expose the epic characters of Nana Yaa Asantewaa's narrative, to study the quality of the artistic composition of the narrative and to give some visibility to women in relation to the narrative of Nana Yaa Asantewaa. This goal has pushed us towards the demand of our main questions : - - - How do we define and recognize the epic ? Does the narrative of Nana Yaa Asantewaa meet the criteria of the epic ? How does the speaker of the epic construct his image and that of the characters in his narrative ? - What is the quality of the artistic composition : the effects of style, the variety of the figures of rhetoric, the oratorical performance of the griot / orator in this asante epic ? Through interviews with her great-grandchildren, we had information that helped us analyze and establish the truth, in order to restore that value to all women. The value of the research established Nana Yaa Asantewaa’s heroism and revealed that despite this epic dimension of Nana Yaa Asantewaa's narrative there is an ideological / philosophical dimension : - Nana Yaa Asantewaa is a deconstruction of patriarchal conventions; - Nana Yaa Asantewaa is a model of patriotism and nationalism; - Nana Yaa Asantewaa has a stylistic dimension; - The narrative of Nana Yaa Asantewaa has a feminist dimension. We humbly recommend that the narrative must occupy a large part of the Asante memory, and that each family must be able to ensure its transmission.
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    Evaluating mobile money services in Ghana; a survey conducted in and around Madina.
    (KNUST, 2017-06) Tamimu, Habiba
    Mobile technologies have become a part of normal life and are changing economic life in developing countries. Almost everybody make use of mobile phone in doing many transactions from business to private usage. This has brought about the advent of mobile money services (MMS) by the telecommunication companies in most African countries, with which Ghana is no exception. Since the inception of this MMS into the Ghanaian economy, there has been a perceived high patronage by the populace. As such there has been spring up of numerous small merchant organizations for this services across all length and breadth of the country. However, there has not been enough studies to evaluate the extent of usage of the volume of mobile money transactions, people‘s preference for the services of mobile money and the challenges of mobile money services thereof. Therefore, this study was set to fill that gap in academia and for stakeholders of the MMS in Ghana to take a cue from. The study conducted a survey in and around Madina in the Greater Accra region using a questionnaire to solicit data on the objectives of the study. A sample of 150 respondents were selected comprising subscribers and merchants of mobile money services in this area. The findings revealed that mobile technology has advanced in functionality and volume of transactions to the extent of enabling users to have financial transactions with their handsets. For instance, it was revealed that the mobile money service is used for paying bills, for meeting daily expenses, for making purchases, for winning social recognition etc. However, a major worry of customers about mobile commerce applications are issues related to trust in terms of security and privacy, is justified to have an impact on customers‘ perception of the service and therefore their intention to use the service. The study therefore concludes with recommendations that would help the major stakeholders of the MMS to improve on the services and create value for users and policy makers.