Publishers Of Offensive Ewe Textbooks Caught In A Confusion Of Lies Over Publication

Regina Badu Nkansah, who inherited the Badu Nkansah Publishing Limited, publishers of the so-called ‘History of Ghana’ textbook which derogatorily stereotyped Ewes as voodoo worshippers, has contradicted an earlier attempt to explain away the ethnocentric content of the textbooks.

In an interview with Accra-based Kofi TV, the woman explained, they had pushed the copies out in a bid to ensure they did not lose in fierce competition with rival publishers.

“Because we were not having money and other publishers were campaigning that we no longer produce books, we had to push some into the system and the schools,” she told Kofi TV while apologizing to the good people of Ghana,” she said.

However, this explanation directly contradicts an earlier statement that a certain Mark Osei, from the same company, had stated that the books were smuggled onto the market because the company had not released any such book.  

Mark Osei claims the company was investigating how the books were released onto the market.

 “How those few copies found their way to the market is something we are still investigating, and we will make the results of our investigations public when we are done,’ Mr. Mark Osei had said in the statement.

The entanglement of lies only serves to enforce suspicion that this Badu Nkansah Publications is a shady company that had gathered a rag-tag team of semi-literates to compose content for textbooks set to be used as study materials for Ghana’s basic schools.

The content of the books is filled with unpardonable grammatical errors, ethnocentric diatribes and blatant historical revisionism of Ghana’s political and cultural history.

For instance, one of the books described Ghana’s first president, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, as a dictator who wasted Ghana’s resources on a pipe dream of African political unity.

Yet, Kwame Nkrumah is documented as the Ghanaian president with the most infrastructural projects ever. In fact, most of the current infrastructure projects in the country had their foundation from what Dr. Nkrumah started or set out in his blueprints.

 Since the release of the offensive textbooks allegations have emerged that the company has ties to the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) and had gotten government contracts to print books as a result of the party affiliation.

In the controversial book, the Ewes were characterized as primitive voodoo worshipers who migrated from the River Niger in Nigeria. Ewes are believed to have originated in Babylon, with some history lines dating back to the time Nimrod built the tower of Babel.

Other historians especially German historians, have identified them as the original Hebrew people of the Bible. However, their most memorable history traces back to Notsie, in Benin.

In one of the derogatory stories in the book published by Badu Nkansah limited, the Ewes are described as people who only easily forgive if they are offended by their tribespeople, feeding into an existing stereotype that Ewes are inward-looking.

Mr. Mark Osei explains how such an offensive book from Badu Nkansah Limited’s stables got to be used in schools to teach impressionable pre-tertiary students, the ‘history’ of Ghana.

“Following the introduction of the new curriculum by NACCA, we submitted a textbook assessment application for approval for our book HISTORY OF GHANA in January last year. We received a response to our application from NACCA on 25th September. The NaCCA raised concerns with portions of the book even though they informed us that the book had satisfied most of the technical and content requirements.”

The statement from Osei shows that indeed the offensive textbook had been okayed by the NaCCA, as confirmed by the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) MP for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa.