Miami Herald - March 4, 2005
Darran Simon, dsimon@herald.com

A group of Ghanaians in South Florida will gather tonight to celebrate the 48th anniversary of their homeland, the first sub-Saharan country in colonial Africa to gain independence.

The Ghanaian Association of South Florida is sponsoring the event at a Holiday Inn in Plantation that includes offering thanks to ancestors, a traditional procession of Ghanaian royalty and cultural dances. Tickets are sold out.

"Being able to fight and win self-governance is probably the most significant achievement," said Sandra Adubofour, a local attorney and association president.

Kwame Nkrumah led Ghana to independence until he was overthrown in a 1966 coup. Ghana went through several more coups and elections before re-establishing democracy in 1992.

"There is an air of optimism and hope," said Akosua Adomako Ampofo, an associate professor at the Institute of African Studies at the University of Ghana, who lectured at Florida Atlantic University on Friday.

The Ghanaian population is relatively small in South Florida. Census figures show 129 Ghanaians in Broward, 113 in Miami-Dade and 52 in Palm Beach County.

Census numbers show 65,572 Ghanaians nationwide and 1,039 in Florida. Though small, South Florida's Ghanaian community is close, Adubofour said. When her father Samuel died last August, fellow Ghanaians quickly came to offer comfort, she said.

"If something happens to one person, within a day or two you are going to have as much of the community as possible rallying together to see how they can help," Adubofour said.

Ghanaians started migrating to the United States in the past 30 years or so, according to Gilbert Kubayanda, a former insurance executive and banker who has been a member of the Ghanaian association since its inception 11 years ago.

Some members are involved with the Ghana America Chamber of Commerce, which has traveled to Ghana with South Florida's business community to spur investment in the country, said Kubayanda, a high school English teacher in Coral Springs.

He said Ghanaians are a "repository of African knowledge" and want to share the Ghanaian culture and clarify any mysteries about the continent.

"We want to dispel the notion that it's a backward place," Kubayanda said. "This is a civilization that is 2,000 years old."

At FAU, Josephine Beoku-Betts, an associate professor in women's studies, is trying to do the same. She works with Adomako Ampofo to lead graduate and undergraduate students to Ghana in the summer to study issues about women and gender.

"When people think about Africa, they think about poverty, famine, HIV and AIDS. Going to Ghana gives them an opportunity to see that life is not always the way it is portrayed by the media or their textbooks," she said.

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