Hey Osagyefo,
I was sitting in a trotro heading towards Adenta after a long day in Adabraka. I headed out knowing that it would take me a while to complete my journey due to traffic. When the trotro got to the HIPIC junction, I found myself thinking and thinking really hard. I just wanted to get home soon but the journey was long, quiet and pensive. All four lanes were filled and moving at a go-slow pace. As we approached the Tetteh Quarshie Interchange, we were still moving so slow, I wondered how bad this situation would be if we still had the Tetteh Quarshie roundabout which had only one lane. No be small thing o.

Kwame, the traffic situation in Accra is still bad. What was running through your head when you maintained West Africa's largest roundabout? I understand Accra's population was very small but did you not see the future? Did you not chart Accra and Ghana's growth and plan accordingly? Why didn't your successors see it? Osagyefo, Accra is suffering. It is choking, its gutters are choking, it is suffocating, its offices are suffocating, it is deteriorating, its roads are. It can't handle Ghana alone, the centre cannot hold. I have been listening to 'No be small thing o' for a while but I haven't really been listening cuz I have been doing too much thinking throughout the journey. Not to worry, I can sing 'No be small thing o' subconsciously.

Osagyefo, let's look at how Accra is growing. Every one and their aunt wants to be in Accra. The retirees are settling in Accra, the young and able bodied around Ghana are flocking to Accra too. The returning professionals cannot find comfort in anywhere but Accra and the citizens who have fell short of the green card lotteries have settled in Accra as well. I am sure you thought Peduase Lodge was your getaway from the business of Accra, Kwame, come and see o, your lodge is filling in to Accra too. Accra even has a mall now, it looks like America; well you can also say it looks like Johannesburg, the South Afrikans built it. I decided to honour it by buying a couple of batteries from Shoprite, a popular South African supermarket. I wasn't able to take more than 10 pictures and the batteries had gone dead. So much for shopping right. Hmmm.

I always thought the Tetteh Quarshie roundabout would be replaced with an Olympic stadium but now we have an interchange. It is one of many infrastructural improvements undertaken by descendants of your political opponents. These improvements are welcome as much as they are long overdue. What the people of Ogyakrom want to know is - who is funding them? Are we tied in to those feeding us? There is no free meal, what is the catch 22 for these new developments. Osagyefo, can we raise the capital to independently run an independent country? Or we have to keep on listening to some foreigners on how we should use their money? Are we going to break free? Who is really looking out for the ordinary Ghanaian citizen? The world bank or our government?

Osagyefo, by now we have passed through the interchange and I am still listening to same song I started listening to when we crossed Hotel de Waa Waa. I have put 2Face Idibia's Ebe like say on repeat for so long, I can't tell you how long it took the troski to get from Shangri-La to Shiasie. In fact, I listened to the song all the way to Adenta, you don't want to know how many times I put it on repeat. It talks about politicians, go figure. Meanwhile, the descendants of the Danquah-Busia tradition have anointed their next king. The guy speaks the Queen's English with a Queen's English because he believes it is the way to speak it. Kwame, welcome the person who might be Africa's first Afropolitan leader. How fitting is the crown the king wears! He shall be leading millions of Afropolitan people who believe all there is to Ogyakrom is Accra.

I was going to finish the blog post with the last paragraph, but I have to report what transpired as I was travelling to come and post to you this letter, Osagyefo. I wake up at one of the earliest times I can remember to try and beat the morning traffic. We set out from Adenta and when we get to Madina, our driver takes another turn to help us beat the traffic. For the next hour, the driver makes all the wrong decisions for the wrong reasons (well, depending on who you ask) and they turn out to be right. This is the smartest most indisciplined driver I have ever seen. He shows me around East Legon and I even discover a small tunnel that runs under the motorway you built from Accra to Tema. All his parambulation is admirable, he has wallowed in traffic too long, and he has discovered shortcuts that even cocaine traffickers could not imagine. I will stop short here, Osagyefo, got things to do and places to go.

The destination for Afropolitans is Africa,
says Maximus.