Seat of Asafos

We spent several days in Winneba, seat of Asafos, just an hour west of Accra. Asafos are Social Clubs derived from ancient kingdoms whose calendars of important dates and events have ruled the town for generations. We arrived Saturday morning on the second and very important day of their largest annual festival. It was hot. The streets were filled with crowds from all over Ghana. Sound systems beat a bass of parades and competition.

We were late, so we assumed that much of the ceremony was over. Quite to the contrary, ceremonies, blessings, events, and even the coronation of the next ruling family had all been put off. How could this happen? Our western minds thought: you have an event scheduled, what could stop you from proceeding? The deer had been caught. A king had stomped three times to kill it. Even here there was discrepancy.

A guard from Sir Charles Beach who walked with us to town our first day gave us his opinion on the controversy, “There can only be one king,” he said, “The people who put forward a second king they are not from here.”

He went on, “We are the overwhelming majority. How can there be two kings? There can’t be.”

In Winneba, Ghana, on the great African Atlantic Coast, this year we learned two kings had been put forward. Only one king will rule. Groups took sides. No one stepped down and calm had broken.

Police had used tear gas, the very morning of our arrival, to disrupt fighting. Who knew? We did not. We could not tell where the lines were split. There were no visible differences. And while discussion of the controversy was animate and testy, the generally civility and functioning of society appeared uninterrupted.

Many different groups of ‘Asafo’ social clubs passed and paraded, running and dancing past us, with flags, matching t-shirts, clothes, robes, and the like. We saw no violence, not even argument. But, we were told the dispute was still unsettled.

Who were the minority? The majority? This is part of the adventure of travel: Not knowing or getting the whole story, having part of your trip ‘lost in the translation.’

We wish the people of Winebba peace and resolution in finding their new king.

So, after three days, we left, wondering what the Asafos do during other times of the year. We wonder about this ancient relation between peoples’ and nature, we wonder how much this similar separation between peoples, the disputes over power, the ancient ritual and its interplay with modernity…we wonder how much we see of this in our own home and every place we visit?