Friday's Child

An honor guard in scarlet tunics and pillbox hats lined the drive leading to the modern statehouse in Accra last week as vintage Rolls-Royces purred up to the door. Inside, trumpets pealed while a stately procession of officers in scarlet or blue uniforms and bewigged justices in red robes followed the gold sword of state. Mounting a dais, Brigadier Akwasi Afrifa, 33, and two other officers were sworn in as members of a new, three-man presidential commission. Then Afrifa administered the oath of office to Dr. Kofi Abrefa Busia, the new Premier, impetuously raising Busia's arm in a fighter's victory gesture. Except for that forgivable breach of decorum, Ghana ushered in the second republic in its brief history with pomp and pageantry worthy of its former British rulers.

Free Elections. Ghana's first republic foundered under Kwame Nkrumah, the megalomaniacal coxcomb who called himself "Osagyefo" (Redeemer). Nkrumah was toppled 44 months ago and sent into exile in nearby Guinea. He is living there on the interest that Guinea is paying on a $2,400,000 loan made during his administration. Since he was deposed, Ghana has been ruled by the National Liberation Council, a six-member coterie of army and police officers.

Anxious to return the country to civilian rule, the council convened a constituent assembly last January and ordered that elections be held.

From the moment the campaign be gan in May, it was clear that only two of the original 15 registered parties had a chance. One was the Progress Party headed by Busia, 55, a sociology professor who spent much of the Nkrumah era in voluntary exile. The other was the National Alliance of Liberals (N.A.L.), led by Komla A. Gbedemah, 56, who was Nkrumah's Finance Minister until the Redeemer turned against him and forced him into exile in 1961. Sophisticated poll watchers expected a close battle. Not the local soothsayers; Busia's first name, after all, means "Friday's Child" in the Akan language, and the voting was held on Friday. The soothsayers proved right.

An impressive 60% of the 2,300,000 registered voters turned out, and the Progressives made it a runaway, capturing 105 seats in the National Assembly to 29 for the N.A.L. and six for smaller parties and independents.

Tribal Appeals. From his exile in rigged" Guinea, elections Nkrumah for the blamed N.A.L.'s di "completely sastrous showing. The party's leaders knew better. To ensure fair elections, the military council had appointed one of Ghana's most distinguished judges to head an election commission. There were triple-sealed tin ballot boxes and acid baths for destroying unused bal lots. A major reason for Busia's over whelming majority was that both par ties appealed for tribal support -- and got it. The Akans, among whom Busia is a royal prince, are four times as nu merous in Ghana as the Ewe tribe, to which his adversary Gbedemah belongs.

"On the surface," says Busia, "I like to appear gentle. But I can be tough if it requires." The premier, a quiet man whom followers refer to as "The Prof" may have to get tough. Living costs and unemployment are spiraling, not to mention the birthrate. Worst of all, Nkrumah's rule left Ghana with $1.45 billion in debts and badly in need of foreign investment.

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