As Ghana approaches its Golden Jubilee of Independence, The Statesman continues to re-visit some of the issues which concerned Ghanaians 50 years ago.

As we reported in last Thursday's edition, March 6, 1957 marks a very different kind of anniversary for those living in the former southern British Togoland, now the Volta Region. Rather than celebrating half a century of glorious independence, families in Kpando, Avalyno and Ho - and surrounding villages – instead commemorate 50 years since the violent uprisings which saw hundreds killed and thousands flee into the surrounding hills, as well as across the border into French Togo. Their call, now as then, is for real independence of their own – with talk of "colonialism" and "occupation" still being fired at a Ghanaian government praised for its focus on freedom and democracy.

In tomorrow"s Independence edition, we will take a special look at the events of that day – speaking with eyewitnesses to the uprisings and the children of those who died.

To understand the uprisings of 1957, and the renewed agitation now, requires a long survey of the complicated history of that region and particularly of the Ewe people, its dominant ethnic group. However, this history is a "repressed" one, according to many Voltarians, who speak of a sustained "campaign of silence" against them – which they say began with collusion and repression by the British governor and CPP administration in the 1950s, and has been passed on through successive governments since.

Today, we speak with those who remember the "real" story of Independence in Volta, including members of the Homelands Study Foundation Group who are campaigning for its new independence and have written a letter to both Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom and Ban Ki-Moon, Secretary General of the United Nations, to request a revisitation of a decades-old plebiscite they want overturned. We speak also to Kosi Kedem, the former NDC Member of Parliament for Hohoe South, who feels so strongly about the harsh hand dealt to the region under the "union" arrangements of 50 years ago that he took his case to the National Reconciliation Commission in 2003.

Half a century since 'Independence,’ for them, little has changed.

The area in question has often changed ownership in the last century or so – from German, to British, to Ghanaian hands, in a series of colonies, protectorates and ‘unions’. Its population, however, has remained largely the same, with the complicated identity and associations of these people explained by the shifting governments and borders of their region. The question of Voltarian succession cannot be considered outside the question of Ewe unity and nationalism.

The Ewe people spread from south-western Nigeria across present-day Benin, Togo and Ghana, in a mass migration movement which began in the 7th century. Their traditional stool seat is Notsie in what is now Togo, but there was a further flurry of migration in the 19th century after some chieftancy disputes. Today, the Ewe in Ghana are not confined to the former British mandated area, but there are also large communities in Eastern Region – and nationwide as a result of continued migration.

The area which now roughly corresponds with the Volta Region is made up predominantly of Ewe, many of whom feel a stronger affinity to their Ewe brothers in Togo and other parts of West Africa then they do with other Ghanaians (and particularly the Ashanti, with whom they fought several wars for land over the 19th century. For battles fought as far back as 1873, it is surprising how well the older generation still "remember" them today.)

Although the Volta question is often seen as one of ethnicity, Voltarian activists are quick to point out that the issue should not be seen as such, however. As Mr Kedem explains, the idea of cross-border Ewe unity had long since been "unattainable," and the area in question comprises many different ethnic groups. The question, rather, should be why the many different groups living within Volta Region continue to feel so marginalised. The answer, he says, can be found in history.

In 1884 the disputed land became a German territory (with the bottom section, the Volta Triangle which includes Keta and Ada, actually hacked off the land mass, however, as Prince Frederick of Germany saved this small slice for his grandmother Queen Victoria of Great Britain as a birthday gift, rather like a piece of cake).

Under German rule, Togoland was a "model colony," and popular or folklore memory now (although very few are alive who actually recall) is of just rule and a fair deal.

However after Germany’s defeat to the Allies in 1918, the land was split by a League of Nations mandate, with half passing into British administration, and the other half into French. In 1923, a fresh ordinate saw Britain’s portion of its First World War spoils further split into two, with the northern section to fall under the administration of the Gold Coast’s Northern Territories – the three main chiefs of the area apparently making this call. Meanwhile, the southern section, made up predominantly of Ewe-speaking people, would be overseen by the Eastern Territories administration.

British mandated Togoland was a separate political entity from the Gold Coast colony, however, and was supposed to remain as such. Legally, British Togoland was a mandated territory rather than a colony, and certain rules applied: the British were not allowed to tap the rich mineral resources of the region, for example – which include gold, diamonds, uranium, oil, iron ore, nickel and mercury.

The French made the distinction between colony and mandate far clearer, managing French Togoland independently of Dahomey and its other colonies in the French West Africa block to its north and east.

On both sides of the newly-imposed border, there were complaints about the new European authorities. From the 1920s, groups were set up to oppose this artificial separation of the people of the former German colony into French and British sections, and call for its end.

In part, their protest was an ethnic one – the border was a barrier to the togetherness of the Ewe people, and in many cases split family and friends between one ‘country’ and the next. The opposition was also based on the records of the colonial masters. "Whilst the British and the French came with their swords, the Germans came with the Bible and with chalk," says Captain Christoph Kwami Brooks, a retired airline pilot, keen historian and Public Relations Officer for the Homelands Study Group Foundation. The Group advocates freedom for former southern British mandated Togoland, and seeks to dispel what it sees as the historical repression of the Volta question.

"The Germans brought peace, education and religion," he says, explaining that German missionaries had been working in what became Togoland since the early 1800s, and that under official colonisation the education system there had been far superior to anything under British and French rule. Indeed, whilst the Germans sought to educate and train a local workforce capable of not only producing but managing for themselves, the British and French had a different approach; overly-educated ‘locals’ could be more of a hindrance or potential threat than a help.

As German-educated Ewes agitated for re-unification, however, and lamented for their lost colony, the world was changing around them – and Germany was once again losing out in war. After its defeat in the Second World War of 1939-1945, again to the British and French, the United Nations was set up to replace the now-defunct League of Nations. British and French Togoland then became United Nations mandated territories, whilst their colonies began to campaign in earnest for independence – their cries given weight by the undeniable contribution of colonial troops to the war effort, and the new focus on self-determination for nations and independent rule.

In the midst of this change, and as the Gold Coast prepared for its Independence date, a United Nations Visiting Mission team travelled to the mandated colonies, to make a report on the demands for change there. It recommended the use of a plebiscite in the British territory of Togoland to determine its future; whether to remain a separate entity when the Gold Coast became independent, or whether to become part of that newly independent nation. One of the lasting contentions of those agitating for change today is that these recommendations were not followed, and that the brand of "union" brought about between the former British mandated Togoland and the former Gold Coast was damaged forever by this failure. The plebiscite carried out in the region in 1956 faces multiple charges of distortions and fixing – and it is on these charges that secessionists today still focus many of their grievances.

The complaints of those living in British Togoland are several: Firstly, the United Nations team had explicitly recommended that the region be divided into four separate areas for the purpose of the plebiscite, because opinion and allegiances varied widely throughout the former colony, and the UN correctly predicted this would be reflected in the plebiscite results. Indeed, whilst the overall result of the plebiscite was 58 percent in favour of the "union" with an independent Gold Coast and 42 percent against, the people of southern Togoland – today’s Volta Region – voted overwhelmingly against the decision. If, as the UN had suggested, the votes for this region had been counted separately, then the people of southern Togoland might have remained an independent territory, their fate to be determined at a later date.

The fact that 19 percent abstained from voting all together is another point of contention, because abstention had been promoted as an obstruction tactic for those opposed to the union. Thus, according to critics, all abstentions should have been counted as an automatic "no" – making the overall result would have swung against a combination with the Gold Coast.

Critics also contest that, far from being carried out by independent observers, it was the British administrators, with their vested interests, who oversaw the vote. The British Governor, Sir Charles Arden-Clarke, was desperate to include the former mandated territory into the new independent nation for two main reasons: the mineral-rich resources of the area, which Britain had been unable to tap, and (according to local belief) the superior educational standards and training of its people.

Already, Voltarian work forces had been used in the Gold Coast to build the Takoradi Harbour, Achimota School and the Supreme Court. Arden-Clarke saw the involvement of the Volta region as crucial to the economic independence of the colony they were relinquishing, and thus worked in connivance with Kwame Nkrumah and his Convention People’s Party to push through a vote which may well otherwise have failed.

It is instructive to note, for example, that there was no political party within the former British mandated territory which was advocating for union with the Gold Coast, but rather a cluster of groups such as the Togoland Congress which opposed the move. Moreover, as the territory was a separately administered political entity, outside political forces were barred from interfering with the internal affairs of the country – all the more reason for the resentment still felt towards Nkrumah’s alleged meddling in the plebiscite, particularly in the northern area where a mixture of intimidation and bribery saw a solid victory for the union.

Then more so than now, the northern part of the territory was incredibly poor and undeveloped. "People were still running around naked in their villages," says Captain Brooks. "The arrival of second-hand clothes and shoes made a big impact on the people there, and the disbursement of bicycles. People were told, ‘if you vote for union, you will get a bicycle. If you vote for independence, you won’t’. How do you think they voted?"

He and others pointed to the lack of education in the rural northern areas, leading to widespread confusion about the plebiscite and its meaning, encouraged by CPP agitators.

The wording – and this is the crux of the opposition today – is also said to have been deliberately misleading. Whilst the UN team had recommended a plebiscite question on the "integration" of former British mandated Togoland into an "independent Gold Coast," the actual plebiscite spoke of a "union":

"Union implies parity and equality," as Mr Kedem points out. "But what we got was colonisation and occupation. If this was to be a true union, where was the Memorandum of Understanding following the event? Where are the papers and what are the terms?"

He is calling not for secession but for equality; the case Mr Kedem put before Ghana’s National Reconciliation Commission in 2003 was of the "forceful integration" of the people of Southern British Togoland into what was then the Gold Coast. It described the integration as a "gross violation and abuse of the sovereignty, liberty, freedom and self-determination" of the people of area – basic fundamental human rights which Mr Kedem and others have argued were flaunted in 1956 and have been flaunted since.

His petition called for the Government and people of Ghana to openly acknowledge the historical injustice and wrong done to the people of former Southern Togoland, and to accept responsibility for the "hundreds of people who were killed, exiled or improperly imprisoned."

He called for the Government and people of Ghana to apologise and show remorse for the "injustice, wrongs and human rights violations" inflicted on people of the region, "in order to bring about true national reconciliation and forgiveness."

As yet, nothing has been done to satisfy his petition, and in January 2005 he published a pamphlet to explain and propound his view. British Togoland: an orphan or death of a nation sets out in some detail the long history of the conflict.

As a former Member of Parliament, Mr Kedem was carrying forward not only his own personal views, but those of many of his constituents and fellow Voltarians; and it is interesting to note the strength of this opinion today, and the continuation of this "occupation" mentality.

Interestingly, Captain Brooks even still refers to Ghanaians as "Gold Coasters": "If this is a union, the Gold Coasters should be supporting us, but instead they are just pressing hard into our eyeballs," he says.

The immediate aftermath of the 1956 plebiscite was of course the 1957 uprisings, still little known-of throughout much of the country, the alleged ‘repression’ of this history certainly backed up by the scanty newspaper reportage of the events.

But the opposition did not stop with the failed risings, and there have been ‘rumblings and complaints’ ever since, according to Captain Brooks – these rumblings sometimes far louder than at other times, and the resultant suppression varying in its intensity.

Had the uprisings begun one day earlier on March 5, according to Captain Brooks, they might have had some real chance of success: "We objected to the lowering of the British flag when we had not explicitly voted for independence." The severance of British funds – with no guarantee of generosity from a government many opposed – was a major part of the concern.

Under Nkrumah, there was a concerted effort to crush the movement forever, according to many, with the free and fair vote of the Volta people in the plebiscite remaining a cause of contention.

Ghana’s first president strived to cut off all funds for the troublesome Togoland Congress as his country moved ever more towards a one-party state and personal dictatorship. Many chiefs in the area still recall how their forebears were chased out of the country by those determined to stamp out their cause.

Nkrumah is not remembered solely as a tyrant in the region; here, as elsewhere, his legacy is mixed and his adherents many. F M K Akpo is the Paramount Stool Father of Ho, and was a local secretary and district secretary under the CPP. He remembers leading a rally to Nkrumah’s hometown of Nkrofoh, and sings the praises of the great Ghanaian liberator.

He found the town little developed: "He was a statesman; he was not fighting for himself but for his country," he recalls.

Nkrumah’s efforts to crush the remains of this "suppressed" history have been sustained, more or less, throughout the years, activists say. One divisional chief, who asked not to be named, told this reporter how he was detained in prison for one week and three months in 1975 under the Acheampong regime. Under the National Liberation Movement of Western Togoland, demands had resurfaced – and were freshly crushed, with many again fleeing or dying in prison. President Eyedema of Togo had given the movement considerable support financially, but the group faded in the late 1970s and 80s as a result of continued Government efforts to stop it.

Prime Minister K A Busia is remembered as a "lovely man," far gentler to the Voltarian cause than either his predecessors or successors, but in general there is a feeling amongst many living in the area that they have been dealt an unfair hand. Even Jerry John Rawlings, the celebrated half-Ewe former president whose popularity in the region has seen his party, the National Democratic Congress, consistently retaining dominance in the region, is thought to have neglected his homeland – reluctant to favour his own people at the expense of national popularity.

The construction of the Akasombo dam and the consequent flooding of many villages in the region has further fed into the general gripes, as well as the feeling of separatism from an area never ‘fully’ part of Ghana. What could be more divisive than the biggest man-made lake on earth, a natural barrier between the area and the rest of the country to which it is supposed to belong? Small fishing villages without electricity, as their lands are swallowed by this mammoth electricity-producing monster, remains an unfortunate reality.

But as old men and historians continue to harp on about a half-century-old plebiscite and an idea about Ewe unity which long since lost its attraction (those who talked of Ghana-Togo unity to bring together the Ewe people now see the instability of Togo and the language barrier as too big a hurdle to jump), what do the younger generation think and know of this historical "repression"?

Activists today lament the "ignorance" of the youth, and the passing away of those who remember the injustices. "Of those who voted in the referendum, perhaps 10 percent are still alive," says Captain Brooks. "In another ten years, they will all be gone."

He and others are trying to "relight the flame" of indignation which has remained glowing – sometimes brightly, sometimes not – through the decades. "I ask them, ‘do you know you are not a Ghanaian?’ and they are surprised. I think people aware of the discrimination, but not why," he says.

Mr Kedem expressed a similar disappointment with the historical knowledge of the young: "The issue has been suppressed for so long, the youth do not even know it is an issue," he said.

Perhaps they should be educated, to stand up and fight; perhaps, as they celebrate 50 years of "Ghanaian" belonging, they are better off without the bitterness of the past.