Africa Politico

On August 21, 1979, Somalia adopted a new constitution via national referendum, giving legal backing to President Siad Barre’s one-party rule. Barre, who seized power in a 1969 coup, used the document to establish the Somali Revolutionary Socialist Party as the sole legal political organization, effectively cementing his authoritarian control. Though presented as a move toward national stability, the constitution instead curtailed political freedoms and entrenched dictatorship. This episode highlights how constitutions, while vital for nation-building, can also be manipulated to legitimize authoritarianism rather than advance democracy.

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On August 27, 1975, Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia, deposed a year earlier by the Derg military junta, died under house arrest in Addis Ababa. Born Tafari Makonnen in 1892, he ruled from 1930, resisted Italy’s invasion, and became a global symbol of African independence, helping to found the OAU in 1963. Though officials cited natural causes, many believe he was assassinated. His death ended Ethiopia’s centuries-old monarchy, ushering in military rule. Selassie remains revered by Rastafarians as a messianic figure and remembered across Africa as both a visionary leader and a controversial monarch.

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Africa Politico

Bode Thomas, Nigeria’s first Minister of Transportation, died on November 23, 1953, in circumstances shrouded in controversy. While serving as Chairman of the Oyo Divisional Council, he clashed with Alaafin Adeyemi II, rebuking the king for not standing to greet him. The Alaafin allegedly retorted, comparing Thomas to a barking dog. Popular accounts claim Thomas returned home, began barking uncontrollably, and died the next day. However, his physician, Dr. Moses Adekoyejo Majekodunmi, later clarified in his autobiography that Thomas actually died from a sudden fever contracted after the meeting, not from any supernatural cause.

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Africa Politico

“Ghana Must Go”: The 1983 Mass Expulsion from Nigeria

In the early 1980s, the promise of Nigeria’s oil boom had begun to fade. The country, once flush with petrodollars, was now battling economic decline, soaring unemployment, and rising crime. Amid the discontent, the Nigerian government under President Shehu Shagari turned its gaze on the millions of undocumented immigrants who had made Nigeria their home during the good years. Among them were over a million Ghanaians, who had crossed the borders in search of work, stability, and opportunity.

On January 17, 1983, the Nigerian government issued a directive: all immigrants without proper documentation had just two weeks to leave the country. The order was sweeping, sudden, and uncompromising. The spark that fueled this drastic move was a high-profile robbery incident at Vice President Alex Ekwueme’s residence, in which two of the culprits were identified as Ghanaian (although this was said to be rumoured and unverified). This event, coupled with the economic hardship, stoked resentment against foreigners and gave the government a convenient scapegoat.

Almost overnight, highways and border posts were choked with desperate families. Bus parks overflowed, and trucks carried men, women, and children crammed together with whatever possessions they could salvage. Lacking suitcases, many turned to cheap, woven, checkered plastic bags, sturdy enough to hold their belongings, yet light enough to carry on weary shoulders. These bags would forever earn the name “Ghana Must Go”, a phrase that came to symbolise forced migration, exile, and survival.

The scale was staggering: over two million West African migrants were forced out of Nigeria, more than half of them Ghanaians. Others included Togolese, Nigeriens, and Beninois. At the Aflao border crossing into Ghana alone, over 700,000 people arrived in just weeks, while others poured into Benin and Togo. In many cases, the journey itself became as harsh as the order. At Seme border with Benin and Aflao into Ghana, tens of thousands were stranded for days in overcrowded conditions. Ghana initially shut its frontier, fearing it could not handle the influx, leaving entire families stuck in limbo between borders. Some perished along the way, trapped in overloaded trucks or weakened by hunger and exhaustion.

Ironically, this expulsion came barely eight years after Nigeria had championed the creation of ECOWAS in 1975, which promised free movement of people across West Africa. The policy exposed the fragility of regional solidarity when tested by economic strain. It also echoed history: in 1969, Ghana itself had expelled over 140,000 Nigerians under Prime Minister Kofi Abrefa Busia’s Aliens Compliance Order. Now, the tide had turned, and Ghanaians were on the receiving end of a similar fate.

For Ghana, the timing could not have been worse. Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings’ regime was grappling with drought, bush fires, famine and economic collapse. The sudden arrival of returnees, many of whom had been breadwinners in Nigeria worsened food shortages and unemployment. That same year, Ghana was forced into deeper economic reforms under the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, with the returning migrants caught in the middle of hardship and adjustment. Yet, in time, many of these deportees would help rebuild Ghana, contributing to its social and economic revival in later decades.

The international community, including the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), condemned Nigeria’s action as inhumane, while Western observers expressed concern at the humanitarian toll. Within Nigeria, the government defended it as necessary to safeguard jobs and security, but not all citizens agreed, civil society groups, church leaders, and journalists criticised the expulsion, recognising the suffering it inflicted. The episode strained relations between Nigeria and Ghana, already tense due to ideological differences between Shagari’s civilian administration and Rawlings’ military rule.

Four decades later, the phrase “Ghana Must Go” endures not only as the name of a bag but as a reminder of a painful moment in West African history. That checkered bag, once a symbol of humiliation, has since travelled the world, used by migrant communities from Lagos to London, Accra to New York, and even reimagined by artists and fashion houses as a cultural icon. It speaks to the fragility of migration politics, the dangers of economic scapegoating, and the ease with which neighbours can become strangers. Yet it also reflects resilience. For today, Nigeria and Ghana, bound by deep cultural, political, and sporting ties, have moved beyond that chapter, proving that nations, like people, can heal and rebuild.

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Nigeria’s Head of State, General Yakubu Gowon, alongside Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, walk in procession from the Senate House after receiving honorary Doctor of Laws (LL.D.) degrees from the University of Cambridge on 5 June 1975.

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