The Kulungugu bomb attack was a failed assassination attempt on Kwame Nkrumah, the

President of Ghana The president of the Republic of Ghana is the elected head of state and head of government of Ghana, as well as commander-in-chief of the Ghana Armed Forces. The current president of Ghana is Nana Akufo-Addo, who won the 2020 presidential el ...

. On 1 August 1962, Kwame Nkrumah stopped in Kulungugu, a minor port of entry in the Pusiga District in Upper East

Bawku Bawku is a town and is the capital of the Bawku Municipal District, district in the Upper East region of north Ghana, adjacent to the border with Burkina Faso. Bawku has a 2012 settlement Settlement may refer to: *Human settlement, a community ...

. There was a bomb explosion aimed at killing the President.

History

Nkrumah was coming from a meeting with President

Maurice Yaméogo Maurice Yaméogo (31 December 1921 – 15 September 1993) was the first President of the Republic of Upper Volta, now called Burkina Faso, from 1959 until 1966. "Monsieur Maurice" embodied the Voltaic state at the moment of independence. However ...

Tenkodogo Tenkodogo is the capital city of Boulgou Province and the Centre-Est Region of Burkina Faso with a population of 61,936 (2019). Economy The villages surrounding Tenkodogo are primarily based around animal husbandry. The main market takes place e ...

Burkina Faso Burkina Faso (, ; , ff, 𞤄𞤵𞤪𞤳𞤭𞤲𞤢 𞤊𞤢𞤧𞤮, italic=no) is a landlocked country in West Africa with an area of , bordered by Mali to the northwest, Niger to the northeast, Benin to the southeast, Togo and Ghana to ...

, at the time known as Upper Volta. The meeting was to sign documents relating to the construction of the major hydroelectric project on the Volta which would become Lake Volta. During the trip back to Ghana, heavy rains caused difficulties for the convoy on the country's bad roads. The Presidential convoy stopped at an outskirts of

to greet school children who had been waving and catching glimpses of the President. A school child, Elizabeth Asantewaa, approached the president with a bouquet of flowers, was severely injured when the bomb exploded. The president was saved by his bodyguard, Captain Samuel Buckman, who instinctively wrestled the president to the ground after hearing the ticking of the timing device. The President and Buckman experience non life-threatening injuries, but 55 other people were injured. Nkrumah was treated by a British doctor at Bawku Hospital, who removed shrapnel from the President's back and side. A memorial stands at the site of the bombing.

Aftermath and trial

Nkrumah accused

Tawia Adamafio Tawia Adamafio (born Joseph Tawia Adams) was a Ghanaian minister in the Nkrumah government during the first republic of Ghana. Politics Adamafio was a member of the Convention People's Party and rose to become its General Secretary. In 1960, he ...

, the Minister of Information, Broadcasting and Presidential affairs, Ako Adjei, Foreign Minister, and H.H. Cofie-Crabbe, executive secretary of the

Convention People's Party The Convention People's Party (CPP) is a socialist political party in Ghana based on the ideas of the first President of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah. The CPP was formed in June 1949 after Nkrumah broke away from the United Gold Coast Convention (UG ...

, of being behind the assassination plot. They were jailed under the

Preventive Detention Preventive detention is an imprisonment that is putatively justified for non- punitive purposes, most often to prevent (further) criminal acts. Types of preventive detention There is no universally agreed definition of preventive detention, and m ...

Act. The three were cleared by a court headed by Chief Justice Arku Korsah in a trial which lasted for a year. Nkrumah had Korsah dismissed, and appointed a new court to recharge the men. Nkrumah handpicked the jury that found the three guilty and they were sentenced to death. Later, the death sentences were commuted to twenty year sentences. After Kwame Nkrumah was ousted from office in 1966, the three were released by the

National Liberation Council The National Liberation Council (NLC) led the Ghanaian government from 24 February 1966 to 1 October 1969. The body emerged from a ''coup d'état'' against the Nkrumah government carried out jointly by the Ghana Police Service and Ghana Armed For ...

(NLC).

References

{{reflist History of Ghana 1962 in Ghana August 1962 events in Africa Failed assassination attempts in Africa Kwame Nkrumah Explosions in Ghana 1962 crimes in Ghana 1962 disasters in Ghana Explosions in 1962