2010: Year of the black center-right

In Ghana, the center-right this year focused primarily on challenging the government’s policies, and promoting a property-owning democracy. The main center-right opposition party, the New Patriotic Party, lost the 2008 presidential election by less than one percent of the vote. Seeking to get an early start on the 2012 presidential election, the NPP has already selected its candidate and is campaigning around the country. Gabby Otchere-Darko, the executive director of the Danquah Institute in Accra, said that the major concern of Ghana’s center-right is “how to get the majority to feel connected to them since democracy is about numbers and the center-right is seen as for the fast-expanding but still small middle class.” He added, “The point is to build a society of opportunities by giving people all a hand up and not a handout. We need to expand the field of socio-economic play to allow more and more people to join the middle class.”

Nevertheless, Otchere-Darko said that Americans can learn from Ghana. “What Americans can learn from Ghana’s center-right is how to win half of the black population to a center-right party!” said Otchere-Darko, a self-described libertarian-conservative. “We have won elections and after the 2008 results, the country is virtually divided in the middle electorally. We have shown that even a poor, black nation can be persuaded to be center-right!”

Akinyemi believes that more game-changing years are to come, as the black center-right across borders increasingly joins forces to amplify their voices. “The next game-changer will be to connect with others in the Diaspora with the urban conservative platform,” he says. “It is imperative to engage and connect with those domestically and internationally who share the same values and influence in education, health, technology, family development and international policies.”

Shamara Riley is the founder of Booker Rising, a news site for black moderates and black conservatives.