John Evans Atta Mills

Today was an interesting day in Ghana to say the least.  President, John Evans Atta Mills, who was elected in 2009 and has been campaigning for reelection this December 7th, passed away unexpectedly this afternoon due to poor health.  Having been here for just over a week, I am in no way qualified to explore the ramifications of Atta Mills' death, but I can say that the people I spoke to were genuinely shocked.  There is a sense that within the party, his death was expected, and the media here have been reporting heavily on a doctor's visit he made in the US earlier this summer.  The VP was sworn in as president this evening and as his first act as president, he has declared a week of national mourning. 

Some people seem to be genuinely reeling from the news.  At the same time, I was surprised how little the course of daily life seemed interrupted by the news.  Street vendors continued selling food, people continued to catch buses, and a photography opening that I had been planning to visit seemed well attended.  I suppose this is all to be expected.  After all, people have to get home from work, have to eat, and have to make money.  The US has not experienced the death of a sitting president since just after Ghana won its independence, but having heard about the day Kennedy was assassinated, the sense of shock that comes with a leader's passing does not seem so foreign to me.  Still, I really wish I had already been here for long enough to have a real sense of what's going on, what people are thinking about.  I suspect that although I am present for this historical moment, I will never really understand it because I don't have enough context to make sense of the events and commentary surrounding this national tragedy.