My name is Gloria Adabie and I am 17years of age. I am in my second year of senior secondary school (S.S.S) education at Ghana National College in Cape Coast. This is situated along the coast of Ghana.

Ghana is my country and it is in West Africa. Our neighbouring country to our immediate east is Togo, on our west is Cote d'Ivoire and at our north is Burkina Faso. The Gulf of Guinea lies at the southern part, which is a section of the Atlantic ocean

Ghana covers a total area of 238 539 sq.km. (92 100 sq miles). It stretches for 672 km from north to south and 534 km from east to west.

There are ten Regions in Ghana. I live in the Ashanti Region, which is situated at the centre of Ghana. Its total area is 24,389 sq km. Kumasi is the capital town of Ashanti Region and also the Garden city of Ghana. Kumasi is situated at the centre of Ashanti Region. I stay in a surburb of Kumasi called Atasomanso Extention. The people of Ashanti Region belong to the ethnic group called Akans. They speak the dialect Asante .Twi.

Kumasi is the seat of the Asantehene. The Asantehene is the chief of all the chiefs in the Asante kingdom.

Ashanti is a region in the middle part of Ghana and its capital is Kumasi. History says that, the Ashantis migrated from Western Sudan to their present land. Their first settlement was at Takyiman in the Brong Ahafo region and later pushed northwards to settle in a place known as Lake Bosomtwe, the only natural Lake in Africa. Others also believe that, the Ashantis emerged from a hole near Asantamanso, a town in Ashanti region whiles others claimed to have descended from heaven. What seems to be certain about the origins of the Ashantis people is that, a nucleus of the Oyoko clan settled around Asantemanso in about the sixteenth century. Small states began to settle around the Oyoko clan including Kwaman (the present day Kumasi ) ,Bekwai, Asumamgya, Nsuta , Juabaen and Mampong.

In due course these settlements developed to be separated but all under one lordship of Denkyira. Two factors encouraged them to come together. First, the desire to free themselves from the rules of the Denkyira, and secondly, to trade with Europeans without having to deal with Fantes as Middlemen. The foundation of this union was laid by two early rulers namely, Twum Antwi and Kosia Amanfi followed by Obiri Yeboah during whose reign, the king established his capital at Kwaman but was killed in an expedition against the DamanThe expansion of Asante Empire was due to two rulers, Osei Tutu and Opoku Ware 1.

Osei Tutu`s mother remained childless for many years. Manu the only sister of Obiri Yeboa was sent to Akwamu to the removed priest Tutu Aban for help in having child. Luckily when she returns, she had a son and in appreciation of the priest's assistance the boy, Osei Kofi was named Osei Tutu .

As a youth, Osei Tutu was sent to the court of king of Denkyira where he fell in love with the sister of the king and impregnated her. Iin order to save his life he ran away to Akwamu. In Akwamu, he became friend to a great priest Okomfo Anokye. On the death of Obiri Yeboa, Osei Tutu returned to Ashanti with Okomfo Anokye. He was then made a chief. By the help of his friend, he was able to unite all the state into one kingdom known to be Ashanti kingdom . To found a capital, Okomfo Anokye did a wonderful thing by planting three different trees in different area or places, namely Kwumawu, Kumase and Manpong but all the trees did not pull though only the one in Kumase. Therefore Kumase was made a capital of Ashanti.

A second thing Okomfo Anokye did was to found a king for the Asante, by displaying his magical powers commanded a golden stool to descend from heaven that is (Sikagyua kofi) On the Stool, all the nails, hair of various chiefs were cut and burned to ashes and mixed with palms wine. All the chiefs drunk the wine from the same calabash. The stool was the soul and symbol of unity to all Asantes. Osei Tutu was made a paramount chief of Asante on the will of all the chiefs.

With the guidance of Okomfo Anokye , Osei Tutu instituted a special annual festival Odwira now called Akwasidae Kessie to commemorate the coming of the golden stool which represents Ashanti Unity and its rich culture. This festival is usually celebrated every year. The recent one attrated so many tourist and was shown on the internet

Alberta Amponsah Armed Forces Secondary College

Nkrumah started work as General Secretary of the U.G.C.C in January, 1948. He saw that certain things had to be done. The first thing he did was to set up an office for the party. One important thingNkrumah did was the formation of "Shadow Government" (this mean that they would have secretaries for the various ministers who would be in their future government). In this way they were preparing for self rule. Nkrumah as the General Secretary was held at Palladium cinema Hallin in Accra (the capital of Ghana) on 20th February 1948. It was at this rally that Dr. Danquah made this statement " If all the leaders of the U.G.C.C fail you Kwame Nkrumah will never fail you"

Later, Nkrumah saw that the U.G.C.C party was delaying things so he set up another party called Convention People's Party with their slogan "Action Now".

In 1957, Ghana achieved internal self government and Ghanaians had more control over the affairs of the country but they still had to continue with the struggle to regain full independence. They felt that the British our Colonial masters were still controlling some affairs in the country which impeded the development of the country. Aside, there were some disagreement among the various parties. So thethen Governor ordered Nkrumah to hold another genral election on 17th July 1956. In this general election, Ghanaians were given the opportunity to choose either the federal system of government or the Unitary type, and under this, there were 104 seats. Any party which won more than half the number of seats was to form the government and lead the country to gain indenpendence. The results of the elections showed that the C.P.P thus Nkrumah's party won 72 seats out of 104 seats. The Governor, therefore, asked Nkrumah to form a government based on the Unitary system.

The date set for granting full self-governmant for Ghana was 6th March, 1957, this date was chosen because it was the date on which the Bond of 1844 was signed. On lthe 5th March , 1957 there was a General Asembly for the people of Ghana on the Polo Ground in Accra. At the midnignht of that day, the British flag was lowered at the National Assembly Hall and Ghana's flag of Red, Gold and Green with a black Star in the middle was hoisted.

Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, who was surrounded by his minsters announced the birth of Ghana to the nation in these words "At long last the battle is ended and Ghana my beloved is free for ever." On that day Ghana joined the Commonwealth of Nations and Nkrumah then became the President of the first Republic of Ghana on 1st July 1960. Due to his good works a musoleum has been built and named after him where his mortal remains are kept for tourist attraction Again one of the leading universities in Ghana has been named after him, thus Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology.

Though Nkrumah was overthrown in 1966 by a military government and died in 1972, Ghanaians as a whole celebrate his birthday every year .

Samuel Adom Armed zForces Secondary College

Dagombas are the descendants of Gbewa. The state of Dagomba was founded by a son of Gbewa called Sitobu. Sitobu led his brothers to oppose the rule of their brother,

Tohogu ,after the death of their father. After the civil war, he moved southwards with his followers to found the state Dagomba. Since Sitobu had better weapons, he became the ruler of the local people. His people were better organised and so they were disciplined and also took orders from their leaders. They did fear to die in war because they wanted to do what they were ordered to do.

The Dagombas were good horse riders, so they took that advantage to defeat the local people because they feared horses. Ya--Na was then the paramount chief of the Dagombas and the greatest of the early Ya--Na was Nyagse who lived in Diara, their capital town. This man was the son of Sitobu, He was a brave soldier who liked fighting and that led him to defeat his enemies. He made the kingdom very big through wars. Whenever he defeated any group of people, he killed the local ruler and chose his own relatives to rule the place.

This allowed the Dagomba people to mix fully with the local people. Because the Dagombas were the decendants of Gbewa, they regarded Mamprusu as their home and regarded Gambaga as their spiritual home .These two places can be found in the northern part of Ghana. The people of Dagomba played an important role in the trade between Asante to the south and other people to the north.

They collected taxes from Hausa and Mosi traders who passed to Asante to buy product such as kola that made the kingdom rich. In addition to this Dagomba town , Daboya also produced salt and traders came from the north to buy the salt.

As Gonja became more and more powerful, which made Dagomba people became worried. During the reign of a Ya--Na, he called Darizigo, the Dagomba kingdom was attacked by the ruler of Gonja, called Ndewura Jakpa, Daboya was captured from Dagomba ruler. Then the Ya -Na, had to move his capital from Dira to Yendi to prevent the Gonjas from capturing that place too.

During the reign of Azigeria, Dagomba gained its freedom from Gonja, but unfortunately, for them the freedom lasted for only a short period. By 1746, Dagomba was defeated by Asante. Yendi was captured and the Ya-Na was forced to pay tribute to Asante every year until 1874.

This history by the Dagomba's has reflected on their present lives that is to say, because they mixed with the people and other tribes it has made them ver popular in the country in the following ways.

Firstly, the title of the paramount chief Ya-Na has been given to one of our Armour cars in Ghana and this has increased the morale of the Dagombas. Out of about 49 languages in Ghana only 7 have been considered as the major languages in Ghana and News are read in Dagomba on radios and some programs on the Ghana.Television, which is a great achievement because not all the languages are used on the media.

Thirdly, they strove to achieve something which was the practice of their ancestors who put in maximum effort to get better place to live and presently, they have tried to acquire large area of land at the Northern region of Ghana. They have big farms and other things and because they were disciplined the Dagombas comport themselves in what ever they do.

Once again the Dagombas have been given high positions in the country e.g. members of parliament, teachers, doctors just to mention a few. Despite the fact that they are disciplined they are domineering and like fighting. If you hear the Dagombas fighting with other tribes it is because of land just as their early fathers were doing.

By Gloria Kwaakye Armed Forces Secondary College

I am Elizabeth Awotwe. I am 16 years of age and SSS 2 student in Armed Forces Secondary Technical . The school is found in one of the West Africa countries called Ghana. I am from Cape Coast in Central region.

This country Ghana has so many natural forest around. Some are found in the village and others are found in the city to attract viewers.

One of the most decorated forest is the Kakum National Park, Cape Coast. The name Kakum was derived from a name of a village called Kakum near the park where I come from. This park is the biggest and the most beautiful National park with a walk way and is one of the three’s in Africa.

It was established in May 5th 1995. This virgin forest has a natural canopy walk with summer houses. People come from outside Ghana to look at the Canopy walk. It has a very beautiful and most decorated garden, a store with a restaurant . From the restaurant to the forest, you first climb a small hill to theforest. From there, there are two paths ahead of you which direct you to places.

The path directing to the right hand side leads to Cape Coast where by the straight path also leads to a bridge. There are small summer houses with four (seats between every bridge. The bridges are seven having different heights . The height start from 40m, followed by 43m continuously, till you reach the last height 73m. When viewers want to walk on these bridges, leaders give black necklaces each and everyone to wear for identification . These bridges are being supported by ropes which is tightened by two big trees.Small woods are also lied in the bridge to walk on. With this the bridges are able to shake while walking on it so they are allowed to walk on it one after the other to prevent any incidence on that. The interesting thing in this forest is that leaders have time to explain to viewers why some animals are not seen in the forest and this is due to the height of the canopy but some animals like monkeys, snakes ,tortoise and the rest can be seen at places near the road side..

This is the end of the brief story on the virgin forest Kakum National Park.

Yaa Asantewaa was an Ashanti born in 1863 and the Queen Mother of Ejisu. Ejisu is a town in Ashanti Region the second largest city in Ghana .It’s population is about one million, because of the workers in Kumasi are staying there. It is a historic town.

During the reign of Yaa Asantewaa the British were giving troubles to the Ashantis. She decided to join the men of Ashanti to fight the British. A time came when the British arrested the Asantehene ,Nana Prempeh1 and many of his important chiefs. They took them to a place called the Seychelles island. It is near East Africa on the world map. As there were no chief left to lead the Ashantis, Yaa Asantewaa led the Ashanti army to fight the British army. She was a brave woman. she and her army fought well, but were defeated by the British .