ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast -- When Ghanaian President Jerry Rawlings arrived in Abidjan on Thursday for a three-day official visit, huge crowds formed, traffic stopped and lusty cheers of approval rang out wherever his delegation went.
Ghanaian immigrants, the busiest commercial fishermen in this country, even took the day off to bring their dugouts into Abidjan's central lagoon for a glimpse of their homeland's leader.
From the extraordinary reaction, one might have thought that Rawlings was a rare visitor from an exotic and faraway land.
In reality, although Rawlings may be a rare sight in Abidjan, his own capital, Accra, is less than an hour away by jet to the east.
What made this visit so special was the evident communion between leaders of neighboring states that seem to have everything in common but have spent most of their independent history as bitter rivals.
The first meeting between Ghanaian and Ivory Coast leaders took place shortly after Ghana's independence from Britain in 1957. Ghana's founding president, Kwame Nkrumah, and Ivory Coast's soon-to-be president, Felix Houphouet-Boigny, had a virtual shouting match as they argued over Africa's future.
While Nkrumah advocated socialism, independence and pan-African solidarity, Houphouet-Boigny argued in favor of capitalism and reliance upon the colonial powers. Unable to agree on much of anything, the two men separated with a famous bet over which country would be the more advanced 10 years hence.
Nkrumah was overthrown before the winner of the bet could be decided, and Ghana was plunged into instability and decay. Meanwhile, Ivory Coast emerged as a showcase of African capitalism under Houphouet-Boigny.
Rawlings first seized power briefly in a 1979 coup. He was not democratically elected until early 1989. Only under his leadership did Ghana seem eventually to find its way. The country has undergone such strong economic growth in the last decade as (( to make the bet between the former leaders worth taking up again.
But instead of resuming the old rivalry, President Henri Konan Bedie, who took over in Ivory Coast after Houphouet-Boigny died in 1993, referred to Rawlings as his "brother" and spoke glowingly of Ghana's economic strength.
For his part, Rawlings said, "This is the warmest reception I've ever received in 15 years as head of state." He spoke enthusiastically of building stronger ties between the two nations, West Africa's healthiest economies.
