The campaign is over. The campaign started when some of our fellow countrymen chose death rather than go aboard slave-ships some two hundred years ago. In spite of our protests, the support which was given us by other parts of the world, our people were carried away to live in captivity, humiliation and discrimination. But despite all this the struggle went on.

When the late Asantehene went into exile, the whole of the Gold Coast agitated for his return; and we all rejoiced when he came back to us to restore one of the important traditional landmarks in our society.

Our fathers, before us, organised the Aborigines Rights Protection Society to protect our lands and to prevent the development of plantations which would have rendered the workers of this country wage-earners on the estates of big commercial concerns. Less than a generation ago, our leaders protested when attempts were made to fossilise our institutions through the systems of Indirect Rule. We have never ceased to agitate for self-government. The West African Congress, the Gold Coast Youth Conference, the United Gold Coast Convention, the Convention People's Party, the National Liberation Movement, are all indications of our people's determination to attain and to secure freedom.

During the campaign, we have had our differences and our frictions. Some will recall frictions which occurred in the Fante Confederacy and also in the Aborigines Rights Protection Society; the disappointment of the leaders of the West African Congress when they felt that their delegation to London had been betrayed; the bitter criticisms levelled at the protagonists of the Provincial Council of Chiefs; the differences which led to two separate delegates being sent to London in 1934; the differences between the United Gold Coast Convention and the Convention People's Party on points of timing, tactics and strategy; and finally the fears of those who have felt that political changes might needlessly obliterate traditional institutions.

Our differences and frictions should have taught us many lessons. We now know that it is possible for our honest convictions to clash. In such circumstances clever political moves solve no problem. If we shut our eyes to inconvenient facts, we only show our weakness. The constitutional lawyer can resolve a political problem only if the people are willing to accept a solution. We shall need to draw upon this experience in managing our affairs as a sovereign state.