Ghana cashes in on slave heritage tourism

ASSIN MANSO, GHANA: In a clearing at the turnoff to Assin Manso, a billboard depicts two African slaves in loincloths, their arms and legs in chains. Beside them are the words,"Never Again!"

"Everyone wants to add the slave river to their tour," she said. The coastal forts where they spent their last days in Ghana in suffocating conditions are also increasingly popular, she said.The increase in tourism has been an economic boon for Ghana, which unlike other West African countries has aggressively marketed its"heritage" offerings for the anniversary.

On a recent day in the capital, Accra, a delegation of tribal elders and a representative of the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre welcomed a tour group at a hotel in the city. The amount is dwarfed by Ghana's US$2-billion cocoa industry but is considered essential in a country of 28 million people who mostly live in poverty.

To make the most of the moment, Ghana will host a mass"ancestry reveal" on Friday. More than 80 African American participants, including the head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, will learn their genetic history, touted as the largest ceremony of its kind in Africa's history.

"The government has a huge responsibility," said Peter Appiah, head of research and publicity at the Centre for National Culture in Kumasi, Ghana's second-largest city. "This is a good place and a bad place. A good place to know your ancestors, but to know what those white people did to us. I can't …" she said, breaking off.

"I have seen a lot of people - they really are coming," said Bouadi, the guide at the castle, who now does up to six tours a day compared with three last year. Each tour has doubled in size, he said, to around 40 people. Despite a collection of slave sites, including the picturesque but haunting Goree Island, where tourists can visit old slave quarters and its"door of no return," Senegal does not appear to have harnessed the potential like Ghana. Neither has Benin or Nigeria.

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