The degradation of our national anthem: Where are the education ministry, service and our music teachers?

Has anyone noticed that parts of the tune of the Ghana National Anthem are not being properly sung in our schools? I have and I am very concerned and bewildered about the silence, apathy or negligence of the Ministry of Education(MoE) and the Ghana Education Service(GES) concerning the level of degradation or corruption in virtually every school from basic to tertiary and across the public and private divide.

Indeed, it will be an absurd, shameful and gross dereliction of duty, if not negligence, for the overseers of education in Ghana to claim to be unaware that the singing of the National Anthem in our schools is substandard.

In other words, I believe, they are fully aware but are helpless about how to rectify the problem.

In truth, the Ghana Armed Forces, Police and the Prisons Services Bands have shown class whenever the opportunity arises for them to play the National Anthem.

A proper identification of the discordant portions of the anthem as sung in our schools is necessary. The discords arise at the following: “freedom and of right”; “with” true humility make us “cherish” fearless “honesty”; “with all our will”; “might forever”.

With these references in context, an attempt to isolate the real solfa notes as against the wrong or degraded, if not corrupted, ones as sung in our schools and carried forward or over from school, is required.

The solfa notes for “freedom and of right” are “s-l-s-f-m-f-s:” as against “s-f-m-f-s:” which is found on the lips of our school children. For “with” true humility make us , the solfa notes for “d-r-m“ for “with” as against “d-m” which our school children are heard singing. For “cherish” the solfa notes are “r-r-m” as against “r-r” which our school children are heard singing. On the line of the “Fearless Honesty”, the discord occurs at “honesty” wit its actual notes as “s-s-f-m” and degraded to “ s:f-m”. The next dissonance is found at “with all our will” which has its original notes as “ s-l-t-d:” but distorted by the school children to become “d-d-d-d” . Finally, are the last two words of the last line of the Anthem. For, while the original notes read “m-f-m-r-d-r-d:” , the school children sing “m-r-d-r-d:” for “ might forever”.

Now, let us assume MOE and GES are not aware of the state of our National Anthem in our schools and let us also assume that the music teachers in our schools do not have access to the original solfa notes of the anthem. Based on this assumption, I will assign MoE and the GES THE TASK OF first, finding out about the state of the anthem in our schools and using the results of the findings to correct the discords or deformities introduced into our National Anthem in our schools. This task or assignment requires collaboration with the music teachers in our schools as they will be directly responsible for the teaching and ensuring that the solfa notes conform to the originally-composed version of the Ghana National Anthem.

As it stands now, the state of the Ghana National Anthem in our schools is a reflection of the poor quality of education, lack of attention to music as a field of academic knowledge, the dearth or irresponsibility of negligence of our music teachers and the weak supervisory role of managers of Ghana’s education system. We cannot remain unconcerned. The nation deserves better.

The writer is a Journalist and a Lawyer.