Peter DiCampo

Previous Work: Samia Nkrumah: Pan-Africanism's Daughter Campaigns

Samia Nkrumah, the daughter of Ghana's first president Kwame Nkrumah, had been living what she calls an "ordinary life." She lived in Italy with her husband, raising their 11-year-old son and continuing her career in journalism and education. But after returning to Ghana last year, for the nation's 50th anniversary and then for her mother's funeral, she knew that it was time for a change. After spending 24 years away from the country of her birth, she resigned from her job, moved her family to Ghana, and began campaigning for a seat in Parliament in the remote district where her father was raised.

Now Mrs. Nkrumah's days consist of blazing across the dusty unpaved roads of the Jomoro Constituency in a four-car motorcade, making campaign stops in village after village in order to visit all 54 of them before elections in December. As her SUV approaches each one, she stands on the car's center console and rises out of the sunroof. She smiles broadly and waves, then begins wheeling her arms in a circular motion. Crowds rush to meet her, dancing and moving their arms in the same circle while shouting the Nzema word, "Yeresesamu!" The word and gesture symbolize something that people here are desperate for, that they hope Mrs. Nkrumah will bring: "change."

Ghanaian Parliamentary candidate Samia Nkrumah points out a photograph of her father, Ghana's first president Kwame Nkrumah, at the museum in Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park in Accra, Ghana.
   
Samia Nkrumah waves to supporters upon arriving at Eluba, Ghana. Nkrumah is campaigning for a parliamentary seat in the area where her father was born, and manypeople there still consider him a national hero.
   
Villagers in Elenda cheer for Nkrumah as she approaches in her SUV.
     
  
Private moments are few and far between for Nkrumah, enjoying Ghanaian food at her campaign headquarters in Bejin, Ghana. The former consultant and freelance journalist faces criticisms that living in Europe has left her out of touch with the needs of Ghanaians.
   
Children wait their turn to fetch water from a well in Mpataba, Ghana. The small village has only two such wells to provide for the entire village. Water shortages, lacking electricity, poor roads, and high unemployment are all issues Samia Nkrumah will be faced with if elected.
   
Women in Tikobo, Ghana gather at one of Nkrumah's campaign stops. Nkrumah, who attained undergraduate and master's degrees from the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies, has called for the greater inclusion of women in the systems of education and government.
     
  
"If you educate a man, you educate one man. If you educate a woman, you educate a family," said secondary student Anthony Ackatia, center, during a Nkrumah campaign stop in Bonyere, Ghana.
   
Samia Nkrumah addresses crowds in Bonyere.
   
Nkrumah campaigned in Nawuley the same day. 'There is no doubt that Kwame Nkrumah's vision for Ghana's development has to come back,' she frequently says in campaign speeches. 'It's the only thing that worked for this country...We are his students, trying to abide by his teachings and rekindle his vision.'
     
  
Samia Nkrumah confers with her campaign staff as crowds are held back in Ezinlibo, Ghana.
   
Bodyguards lead Samia Nkrumah into a campaign stop in Bonyere.
   
Crowds cheer as Ghanaian Parliamentary Candidate Samia Nkrumah arrives at a campaign stop in Bonyere.
     
  
Ghanaian Parliamentary Candidate Samia Nkrumah leaves a campaign stop in Bonyere.
   
Ghanaian Parliamentary Candidate Samia Nkrumah leaves a campaign stop in Bonyere, Ghana. Mrs. Nkrumah visits at least five villages in the Jomoro district every day so that she can reach all of them before Ghana's elections in December.
   
Ghanaian Parliamentary candidate Samia Nkrumah poses for a portrait in the museum at Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park in Accra, Ghana.