Play the Game of Life
Ryan Petersen's Blog

Cape Coast Castle, one of the largest and best preserved slave forts on the coast of Africa.



Osu Castle, a former slave trading fort as well as the seat of British Colonial rule in Ghana, is now the office of the country's presidents.

A few interesting (and haunting) things about the slave castles, giant forts built by the Europeans to protect their slave trading dominions along the coast of West Africa:

The forts were built more to defend against rival European powers (the Dutch, Portuguese, English, French and Danish were all active along Ghana's coast at various points in time).

To stamp out insurrectionist sentiment, the Europeans locked up uncooperative slaves in a dungeon, where they would be left without food or water until they died. The corpses were not removed until the last person had died. You can still see scratch marks where dying slaves attempted in vain to claw their way out of the dark cells. Naturally other slaves were employed to remove the dead bodies. The message got through, I've no doubt.

Slaves were purchased from local traders primarily in exchange for rifles. Using these arms, the slave raiders would have little trouble overcoming villages in the interior to capture more slaves.

In both of the slave castles we visited, Elmina and Cape Coast, the primary slave dungeon are located directly beneath the forts' chapels. Indeed, the first Christian church in Ghana is the chapel above the Elmina slave dungeon.

In Elmina, the governor had a special viewing balcony that allowed him to pick out the most beautiful slave girls and bring them up through a private staircase through a trap door to his bedroom.

Labels: Ghana, slavery, West Africa

The primary interaction of most West Africans with their state appears to come through shakedowns at random police checkpoints. We've found these roadblocks in our path every hour or so all the major roads in Ghana, Benin and Togo. Heavily armed officers interrogate drivers and search vehicles, ostensibly in search of drugs and guns. Locals say these roadblocks are necessary because of the huge inflows of drugs from Nigeria in recent years. Yet it seems clear that the cops are just hoping to find a violation of some pety regulation so they can extract a bribe.

Oddly, during our traverse from the Burkina Faso border to the coast of Benin, we crossed eight roadblocks, each with officers boasting completely different uniforms. The first few times we encountered the mix-matched uniforms, I thought we were about to be robbed by a gang of armed thugs posing as cops. Ultimately when they saw that we were white, they let us go after asking if we have "tried" Beninoise girls, telling us they want to go to America, or making some other comment humourous only because it came from a guy with an AK-47.

I'm told that having a nice car will get you past these checkpoints without problem, because they assume you may be important and don't want to risk getting in trouble. When did these roadblocks come about? Besides reducing travel times and speeding commerce, what would happen if they were eliminated? What percentage of a police officer's income comes from petty bribes at these checkpoints rather than through their salaries? Is there some other way to control contraband besides random searches of all travelers? And why do West African countries have customs checkpoints at random locations deep in their interiors?

Labels: Benin, corruption, Ghana, Togo, West Africa

Still under construction, Accra's most modern office tower shimers in the sunlight. Something its owner is not likely to enjoy for sometime, as he was arrested for cocaine trafficking not too long ago. Work goes on, however, as he appears to have successfully transfered the assets to his mother. All this is just gathered from a few taxi drivers who took me past the building. If anybody has more info on this story, please post to the comments.

Labels: Africa, corruption, Ghana, West Africa