The Director of the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park in Accra, Mr. Kwaku Manu-Asiamah, says he suspects that the missing head and arm of the vandalised bronze statue of Dr Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana's first President, are being kept secretly by "somebody" in the country who wants to keep them as personal treasures.
Mr Manu-Asiamah, who was speaking to the Times in Accra on Thursday, said confidential information reaching him indicated that since Nkrumah's overthrow in a military cum police coup d'etat on February 24, 1966, the severed head and arm appeared in public for the first time during Ghana's 40th independence anniversary celebrations.
They went missing again after that. He did not assign any political motives, but appealed to the person(s) keeping them to return them because they were now state property.
Mr Manu-Asiamah underscored the touristic importance of the statue to the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park, saying, it was the most significant attraction to the park's visitors.
Mr Manu-Asiamah said the bust was designed by an Italian sculptor, N. Catav Della, in the early 1960s under the personal supervision of Dr Nkrumah who ensured that specific details and features were not left out.
The statue was originally mounted at the Old Polo Grounds, the present site of the Memorial Park opposite the Old Parliament House.
It was attacked and vandalized by a mob in the wake of the 1966 coup. It was kept without its head and arms at the national museum until 1975 when it was loaned to the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park, and mounted there on June 11, 2007.
Source: Ghanaian Times
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