By Isaac Frimpong (PhD
At 4:30 a.m., the power goes out. In my part of Accra, that is not unusual. While some homes have their lights restored almost immediately, thanks to solar systems or generators, others remain in darkness, waiting with no clear sense of when power will return.
A few hours later, as the city begins to move, I watch children set off for school. While some walk to nearby public schools where buildings need repair and resources are stretched, others are driven across town to private schools with orderly compounds and foreign curricula. Even at that early hour, two different educational worlds are already in motion.
The contrast continues on the roads. As smaller cars struggle through potholes and waterlogged sections, high-clearance vehicles move with relative ease, absorbing shocks that would otherwise disrupt the journey. What appears to be a matter of convenience is, in reality, a question of access to what the road allows some to do while limiting others.
By mid-morning, my phone rings. A relative has been taken to a hospital, and there are no beds available. While one might expect a search across other public facilities, the conversation shifts quickly towards whether a private hospital can admit the patient or whether arrangements should be made to travel abroad. By midday, the pattern is clear: a system split in two: a private Ghana that works for those who can afford it, and a public Ghana that struggles to meet basic needs.
Who Lives in “Private Ghana”?
In this context, the “elite” are often misunderstood. They are not simply the rich or the highly educated, but rather those who can consistently operate beyond the limits of public provision. While others depend on state systems, they replace unreliable electricity with solar power, substitute pipe-borne water with boreholes, avoid public hospitals, and bypass public education.
As road networks deteriorate, they rely on vehicles designed to absorb the damage, while weak public transport systems are replaced by private mobility. When healthcare systems come under strain, they turn to private care or seek treatment abroad.
These choices are often described as adaptation, or even resilience, but they point to something deeper. What appears as individual problem-solving, when taken together, becomes a pattern of institutional side-stepping. While opting out may be a rational response to failure, it carries consequences.
As dependence on public systems declines, so too does the urgency to demand improvement, especially from those with the influence to push for change. The pressure that should drive accountability weakens, and what begins as a response to dysfunction gradually contributes to its persistence.
Education and the Question of Distance
This dynamic has an intellectual echo in The Mis-Education of the Negro, where Carter G. Woodson argued that education can shape how individuals see themselves in relation to their society. He warned that it can also create a disconnect between the educated and the broader population, not only in opportunity, but in expectations and identification.
A similar pattern can be observed in Ghana. While education is often tied to external systems and standards, it can reinforce the idea that progress lies outside the institutions we share. Over time, this produces not only different outcomes, but different relationships to the same country.
This is most visible in the structure of education itself. While a small segment of the population follows a defined pathway: private schooling, international curricula, and often opportunities beyond Ghana’s borders, many others face a far less certain trajectory. The difference is not only in quality, but in direction. Education, which should broaden opportunity, is increasingly creating separate pathways.
A Growing Divide in Perception
As these differences deepen, they begin to shape perception. Many who remain within public systems increasingly see those who have opted out as part of an establishment: people who benefit from a system they no longer rely on. Yet those who have opted out often see themselves differently.
They view their choices as the result of effort and necessity, not as participation in a system that excludes others. Within this gap in perception, distance grows. People begin to experience the same country in fundamentally different ways, even as they live side by side. Expectations of the state diverge, trust becomes harder to sustain, and the sense of shared responsibility begins to weaken.
Conclusion
At the centre of this is a structural problem. Some of the most influential people in the country no longer depend on public systems, and their well-being is no longer tied to how those systems perform. As that link weakens, so too does the urgency to improve them. No country develops on the basis of parallel systems.
Sustainable progress depends on shared institutions—schools that serve across social lines, hospitals that people trust regardless of income, and infrastructure that supports everyday life for everyone. These systems create a common experience when they function, but they divide when they do not.
From where I stand, Ghana must confront not only how to fix its systems, but how to rebuild a shared stake in them. Because a country cannot move forward when too many of those with the voice to drive change no longer need the system to work.
Isaac is the Host, The MINGOP Initiative Podcast (YouTube)
Lecturer, University of Gold Coast
[email protected]
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