Chicken And Rice

Thursday, January 10th, 2008
by George Appiah

What can chicken and rice get you? Not much. Well, that’s what I’d say, as I don’t take in meat, and don’t really like rice. But apparently others — very prominent people in our society — will do just about anything for a plate of chicken and rice.

Yesterday I had a great conversation with one expatriate (who came to Ghana as a cook, and is now the General Manager of a major hotel chain) who has found the almost magical power of chicken and egg to get whatever he want from Ghanaians.

• For chicken and rice, this man says he can buy a minister (not the religious type, but I guess those will be even cheaper to buy — say, for banku and wele? )
• For chicken and rice, he can buy a judge of our courts
• For chicken and rice, he could even kill a person and run away with it (how? because he can keep a medical doctor away from his patients — with just chicken and rice!)
• And… for chicken and rice, he can get any Ghanaian girl to open her legs (but I must add that my expat friend says he’s not done this before — and my thinking is that he has found no need to use this chicken and rice bait at all, as these girls, willingly come in a drove!)

We spoke at length about many other issues, and this man’s openness and deep insights on these other issues (especially those involving technology, which I was very much aware of already) left me no reason to doubt his chicken and rice story at all.

Hello Ghana! In our quest for daily survival and economic significance we seem to have left something behind: our daily prayer for God to make us cherish fearless honesty. Or is it that God is not answering our prayer?

And looking at the high-profile people this man claims to have been able to buy with nothing but a plate of chicken and rice, I’m left wondering what’s happening further down their ranks.

Help us, oh God, please do!