World prices slump sparks Ghana coup
By Tom Kemp
1972Tom KempAfricaEconomic crisis Read the scan at ETOL (PDF) →Read from the scan by machine and not corrected: headlines and words can be misread, and a caption or advert can run into the text. For anything you quote, read the scan.
RIGHT-WING seized power i an overnight c army officers and civilians have n the W African state of Chana in oup.
They took advantage of the absence of the prime minister, Dr Kof Busia, who is in London for medical treatment, to depose him.
A new government been proclaimed in capital, Accra.
It is headed by Lt-Col Mike Achampong in the name of a new National Redemis tion Council. Achampong said to be deeply religious.
The government has fallen into increasing disrepute over the past few years and has been accused of corruption and inefficiency, but its record in this respect could not match that of Kwam e Nkrumah. His regime's spectacular, costly and sometimes mystical projects bankrupted the country.
The precarious Ghanaian economy, which depends on the export of cocoa and other primary products, has been hit hard by the slump in prices on the world market.
Rising costs, food shortages, chronic unemployment and a sense of hopelessness have fired growing popular contempt for the Busia regime.
A good deal of proNkrumah sentiment still exists in Ghana and two political parties—the People's Popular Party and the Ghana Action Party--support his return.
The Convention People's Party which ruled the country Nkrumah's day has remained banned.