Catz 31 – 7 LMH/Trinity

UPON promotion to the top flight, the last thing any side would want is to face a team that ran in over a hundred points in their last two fixtures. Unfortunately for LMH/Trinity, an in-form Catz were their opponents in the first game of the new league season.
Dark clouds and driving rain greeted the Division One new boys, who arrived without any substitutes and therefore no margin for error in terms of injuries. Catz, too, had players out, but even their shallow strength in depth was more than enough to comfortably see off their newly-promoted visitors.
With the home side coming into the game on the back of a second place league finish – the college’s best in years – they were looking to build towards going one better in the new season.
Catz began by tearing into LMH from the kick off, immediately camping deep in their opponents’ twenty-two. The only reason for the home side being denied an early score was a slight lack of composure in front of the line.
All that changed on ten minutes after some hard-hitting play in the midfield saw the ball find Catz outside centre Femi Fadugba.
Embarking on one of his trademark jinking runs, Fadugba left the LMH defence trailing in his wake before touching down underneath the posts. Captain Sam Donaldson converted to give his side an early 7-0 lead.
Catz barely let their opponents catch breath, running the ball straight back into the Tigers’ half and causing all sorts of problems for their defence. Good work from the home pack allowed the backs to put through Peter Jones for the first of his two tries.
At this stage LMH were on the ropes, being repeatedly jabbed by their hosts. Time after time Catz would break the defence, with Donaldson adding to his points total with a try and another conversion.
By now, even the St. Catherine’s forwards were after a piece of the action. Prop Tom Ward took a great inside ball before good work from hooker Charlie Thompson led to Matt Perrins touching down for the fourth try, plus conversion, of a punishing first half for LMH.
The Tigers looked more fired up after the break and took advantage of a sleepy Catz to score a converted try of their own, but were immediately brought back down to earth with a second try from Jones.
Injuries on both sides then brought down the quality of the game, with uncontested scrums being introduced thanks to a front row casualty. Catz came close to scoring a sixth, but Jamie Menzies was brought down just before the line.
Their dominance of both the lineout and the tackle area meant that the Manor Road outfit would always create more chances, and wing Leo Masson forced good covering tackles from the Tigers’ defence.
With LMH’s numbers dropping as low as twelve thanks to injuries, the referee brought matters to a close ten minutes ahead of schedule.
On this evidence, the new members of elite rugby have a lot to do to retain their top flight status. Upcoming fixtures against Magdalen and champions Keble leave LMH with little chance of picking up any points before Christmas. Catz, though, will fancy their chances of improving on last season’s second after a strong start in poor conditions.

It is difficult to imagine what Union President Luke Tryl envisaged when he first decided to invite Nick Griffin and David Irving. Did he believe there would be a fierce but gentlemanly debate in the chamber, with Oxford students feeling a sense of pleasure that free speech was encouraged and extremism ground away? Whatever his intentions, sincere and genuine that they were, he could not have predicted the scale to which the local and national community would focus on a debating society clustered in a small corner of Oxford University.
With the weeks and days to the 8th week forum drawing closer, the Oxford bubble has burst and continues to be ripped apart by the national press. Condemnation rather than applause has been heaped on the Tryl administration, with the exception of the far right, who have already taken advantage of the situation to claim a moral victory.
What the invitations have reaffirmed is the importance of the Oxford Union in a national context. Everyone, from right-wing bloggers to professional media pundits, has had something to say on the issue, no matter their geographic or  intellectual distance from the University.
Already, however, the event has been overshadowed by negative repercussions for Oxford students. The issue has caused serious divisions and fractures within normally unified colleges. The threat of protests and demonstrations has hit minorities, particularly for students from the Jewish and Muslim communities. They rightly fear a sudden influx of pro-debate protesters from far-right groups like the British National Party.
But conversely, many ordinary students wish to see the debate, yet fear being labelled racist or anti-Semitic by demonstrators for doing so. Even journalists at this newspaper, ordinary students without any extremist views, have been personally accused of reviving Holocaust denial by the national press.
With his term coming to an end, it will be interesting to see how posterity treats this Union President. Was he a deliberately divisive leader with no concern for minority opinion, a media pariah, seeking out controversy for his own fame and publicity? Or was he a brave advocate for the Union’s role as “the last bastion of free speech,” daring to challenge the silence and taking on extremists single-handedly?
Whatever the final judgement, Tryl is to be admired for sustaining blow after blow of withering criticism and sticking resolutely with his beliefs. At Liberty’s recent ‘Big Debate’, an indicative poll of a few hundred Oxford students showed that roughly three-quarters were behind him, and Tryl has promised a poll of Union members’ opinions to be held concurrently with the termly elections.
But what has this all achieved? Fear, violence, intimidation and division. Although there may be discord and perhaps even arguments between Oxford students, in the face of outside interference we must unify. When all is said and done, Union matters are the business of Oxford students only, and not for external groups who believe they know what’s best, or that we are incapable of solving our own problems.
To British National Party supporters and national anti-fascist groups, to Holocaust deniers and their opponents, to all and sundry who would involve themselves in our affairs, we quote this newspaper’s first editorial in 1920. Like those students before us, in the face of absurd politics we call for whimsical parochialism: let us “exclude all outside influence and interference and from our University. Oxford for the Oxonians.”

ON a wet and windy afternoon, spectators who braved the conditions were treated to an extremely physical encounter between the increasingly dominant Keble and a dogged Hall side, Keble running out 14-7 winners to continue their unbeaten run.
Keble entered the game as league champions and, fielding an unchanged side, were definite favourites to beat a Hall outfit that had just avoided relegation. To make matters worse for the Teddies, they were also without their injured iconic captain Phil Satterthwaite, meaning that they were forced to to concede five points and play with uncontested scrums.
Starting 5-0 down, Hall were eager to get early points. After a scrum on their opponents’ twenty-two, fly half Harold Buchanan fed the all-American Marc Wayshak in midfield who ploughed through two tackles to score under the posts. The try was converted to make it 7-5 and give Teddy Hall an early, morale-boosting lead.
Keble then began to get into the game, playing simple but effective rugby, with good ball retention. The Hall defence held strong, but was eventually forced into conceding two penalties which were duly kicked by fly Half Peter Bolton to regain the lead for the home side, making it 11-7.
Late in the first half, a poor kick from Keble that failed to find touch was seized upon by Tom Theodore, who glided through the home side’s defence and fed Wayshak on the right wing. With the try line at Hall’s mercy, the last pass failed to go to hand and was fly hacked into touch to the sound of the half-time whistle.
The second period was played out in a similar vein to the first. Early Keble pressure led to another penalty, again converted by Bolton, but they were unable to threaten the Hall try line. Hall’s defence was ferocious, with back rowers Patrick Cooper and Dusan Uhrin stopping the Keble forwards on the gain line.
However, the Teddies simply did not take their chances in attack: four clean line breaks were made in the second half which were not turned into points. Keble’s basic but controlled rugby eventually held on, and they emerged deserving winners at 4-7 thanks to Hall’s lack of clinical finishing.
After the game Keble captain Max Cole was happy with the result saying ‘We’ve come away with a win, and that’s all that really matters’. Hall captain Satterthwaite, after having to watch the game from the sidelines, called his side’s performance a ‘defensive masterclass’ and rued Hall’s missed chances.
A solid but unconvincing win by Keble should set them up to win this second league with reasonable ease whilst Hall, having produced their most spirited performance of the year, will know that if they can turn breaks into points they can, and should, finish in the top half of the table, instead of fighting relegation yet again.  

by Peter BowdenAll student journalists must die; every single one, rounded up and shot in the face at point-blank range, for the good of humanity. I don’t exaggerate; we’d lose nothing. Hear me out.
We are not in a golden age of student journalism. Whatever the opposite of gold is, that’s the age we’re in – the age of soil, or gonorrhoea, or festering cats.
Originality is dead: this is an age in which it’s hard to find a non-news article starting with anything other than (1) a vapid rhetorical question, (2) “You probably think some baseless stereotype is true – well, THINK AGAIN!!!”, or (3) some needless recitation from the Big Book of Oxford Clichés, as though Pimm’s were offering ballgowns lined with crack for every reference.
This is an age in which the whole stinking shebang is run by grey, insufferable sub-humans who the words “malaise” and “brainstorm”, and still think they’re going to change the world. Change the world, rather than – say – spend five years “in media” fetching lattés and spellchecking the sudoku, before getting their only break as a stand-in online Guardian columnist explaining how the new Lily Allen album really reminded them of the Palestine situation. Before dying alone. And poor. Probably.
My first contact with the world of student journalism was in my first term here, at a meeting of the Features department of the Oxford Student. Going to this was, naturally, a bad idea on more levels than I can ever find words. We did start with “brainstorming”, which in itself was enough to make me want to gouge out the vocal chords of everyone in the known world, armed only with a biro, and grim, righteous determination. I held back.
The format went as follows: one of them would give a broad, sweeping topic idea, unoriginal to anyone who’d as much as scanned the contents page of an in-flight magazine. Then they would end the sentence with the words, “maybe we could do a feature on that?”, and then there’d be nods, and that would be it. Idea. Conclusion. Repeat. Nothing else was ever needed.
The first was “Abortion. Maybe we could do a feature on that?”, as though they just expected to splash some dead foetus pictures over a centre-spread, slap on a quick point-counterpoint, and call this an article. Next we had “houses”. “Prostitution”. Then, for some reason, “China”. Few of us had been bemoaning a recent lack of China-centric OxStu journalism, but still this got the nods.
Here I abandoned all hope, and considered the use of the biro in self-lobotomy. In retrospect, this might not have helped: most likely they’d just have seen the blood gushing through my nostrils, then they’d wait, point, and say, “maybe we could do a feature on that?” They’d snap a few polaroids, and use me as a tragic example in a poignant piece on student self-harm. Clearly, I’d be a popular, handsome student, and their first sentence would probably be along the lines of: “You probably think life in the ‘dreaming spires’ is heaven for everyone. Well, THINK AGAIN!!” They’d call this a “scoop”. Death’s too good for them.
There might be a case made for their existence, if only they didn’t insist on being taken quite so seriously. On the way into the meeting, we were told not to leak anything to Cherwell. This made me laugh on two levels. First of these was at the thought that they were half-expecting Cherwell spies to sit for an hour, make notes, and report back: “An article on China, you say? We must outmanoeuvre them! Get me a typewriter!”
Secondly, more importantly, I laughed at the implication that anyone would truly care that much about student papers: they don’t. Contrary to their own delusions, Cherwell v OxStu isn’t actually World War VI with Fit College and pashminas. As battles of wit and guile go, it’s closer to Soggy Biscuit – an analogy which, coincidentally, works on a number of levels.
If the infamous million typewriting monkeys could manage Hamlet, it’d take them half an hour to shit out an Oxford Student, before moaning at being overqualified, and applying for jobs in telesales. Kill all the student journalists – and now I’m here, I’ll be happy to start with myself.

NOT every Blues squad can boast an ex-international with forty-three caps and three league titles, not to mention a hat-trick of FA Cups, spurring them on from the sidelines. In fact, this claim can only be made by Oxford’s footballers, who have the privilege of being coached by the former Arsenal centre back Martin Keown for the 2007/08 season.
Oxford-born Keown, 41, is spending a year with the side as they look to make amends for last year’s Varsity defeat, on penalties, to Cambridge. The veteran defender is also taking his UEFA A coaching license whilst guiding the Blues through their debut season in the BUSA midlands top division.
Watching the veteran defender stalk the touchline, pausing briefly to bark out instructions to his players, it was easy to imagine the man in his pomp, towering over strikers and intimidating the opposition with his sheer presence.
After overseeing his side’s 2-1 win over Nottingham, including a backs-to-the-wall final twenty minutes, Keown revealed how his taking the reigns of Oxford football had come about.
“It was actually me who approached the University” he said. “I rang up John Roycroft, Oxford’s Director of Sport, and asked him if there was any way in which I could help out with the football here.
“The reason for approaching Oxford was that, besides being close to home, I’d have the opportunity to run the team and coach young players who are keen and willing to learn. It was also a good chance to gain real experience alongside taking my UEFA coaching badges.
“Basically, I took this on to see whether I still love the game enough to go back into the professional side of things. This team is giving me my football fix at the moment and the experience of managing these players will be invaluable in the future.”
The Highbury legend is not just here to further his own career, though. Keown enthused about bringing fresh players into the Blues set-up and appeared genuinely excited about helping to raise the profile of the sport in Oxford, and all the challenges that come with it.
“The most difficult element so far was probably the system of trials that we held at the start of the season” he said. “I hadn’t experienced a situation like that in a long time, so we’ll probably be looking at changing that aspect of the system somehow.
“What we don’t want is players slipping through the net as they’ve done in the past. There’s a lad called Cameron Knight, now in his third year, who only made his Blues debut this season. There has to be a better way of identifying talent throughout the university than the present trial system.”
When pressed on which of his players have particularly caught his eye this term, Keown was quick to avoid singling out just one or two men. “We’re a team, not a group of individuals” he insisted.
“It’s been hugely satisfying to see our improvement this term. The boys were beaten heavily by a representative side in our first game, but we’ve gone on to pick up some great results and challenge at the top of a tough division.”
Away from the league, though, student eyes will surely be looking to Varsity and a triumph over the Tabs, although Keown played down the importance of the set-piece fixture.
“I’m not just looking at this season in terms of Varsity” he said. “People will probably judge us on that one fixture, but in my eyes the sign of a quality team is showing consistency in the league.”
Arsenal fans in particular will be keen to learn whether Keown’s chest-thumping, aggressive demeanour on the pitch has translated to his fledgling career in coaching.
“I do try to be a bit calmer as a manager” he laughed. “What I like to see in football is composure on the ball and then aggression when you are trying to get it back. I always want to see my players putting in 100% effort out on the pitch, and thankfully the lads here have never given me less than that.”
Keown was turning out for local side Marston Saints when he was spotted by Arsenal, launching him on the way to a glittering career. Who’s to say, with the Blues riding high in their league and the man himself clearly relishing being back in the sport, that a second life in coaching won’t also begin with an amateur side in Oxford?

by Debbie DanceO n Tuesday, Oxford City Council will consider an application from Oxford University for its new library depository, which it hopes to site on the western edge of Oxford on the low-lying land which leads up to the River Thames. From here, too, the views of the ‘dreaming spires’ immortalised in the paintings of J M W Turner and the poetry of Matthew Arnold can be seen. Permission is close to being granted, however shocking and surprising this might seem.

What is proposed is essentially a huge warehouse in the foreground of the view, standing up above the City Council’s upper height limit of 18.2 metres in some parts, and showing blank inward-looking windowless walls to house the automated book stacks inside.

By employing sophisticated techniques, the University can use photographs and computer generated images to demonstrate that the new warehouse will have little impact on the view, an experience which Bodley’s Librarian describes as akin to looking for Wally in a Where’s Wally cartoon book in a recent article in The Oxford Magazine (2nd Week Michaelmas).  Their architects have added some works of mitigation, just in case, which take the form of a curved roofline, tree planting and colouring the building green. 

In our view, Councillors and others have been persuaded falsely by the University.  This building will not be fine, and will appear as much larger and more prominent than is being suggested, drawing the eye and incongruous in the landscape. 

We do not dispute that a new Depository is necessary for a University of such world-class status.  We are told that there are no other available sites, and it must go here.  However, we cannot agree, this is not a suitable site for such a building whatever the techniques used to disguise it. This site is in the views and on the edge of the low lying flood plain which was the subject of the extraordinary floods this summer.

The Trust has tried calling on the University and Colleges to get together and think again over this. We have not been successful. What legacy that in the 21st century that the University acts in such a negative way in damaging the very views of Oxford that it has created over 700 years, and in which the Radcliffe Camera and Bodleian Library have played such a significant part.”Debbie Dance is Director of the Oxford Preservation Trust, which owns owns over 600 acres of land in and around the City. Further details and images are available on the Oxford Preservation Trust website at www.oxfordpreservation.org.uk
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Oxford, the site of so many significant scientific discoveries, is the perfect place for a History of Science Museum. Largely ignored despite its prominent position on Broad Street next to the Sheldonian (yes, that’s the building with the heads…), the permanent displays are well worth a visit. The display cabinets chart centuries of scientific endeavour: the highly ornate instruments reminding you that science can be beautiful as well as utilitarian. Even if you’re not a scientist (perhaps especially if you’re not a scientist) you should pay this place a visit. However, this month in particular, there are two exhibitions which you should visit.  
The Book of Imaginary Science is a series of sculptures by Roddy Bell. It is an exhibition concerned with ways of seeing. Alice Liddell’s Camera explores the dichotomy between reality and fantasy, self-perception and self-image. John Dee’s Angel of the Hours Clock is a beautiful and complex exploration of belief, and the desire to see the divine, the rotating contraption almost as fragile and ephemeral as the angels supposed to appear on them, ‘projected from the eye’ of a believer. All five pieces explore notions of personal identity and reality; in particular, the relationship between image and truth. The pieces are interspersed amongst the long-term residents of the museum’s collection, further blurring the lines between fact and fiction. 
Small Worlds is a series of rooms through which one walks, handset of poetry pressed to one ear, each room immersing you in a new microscopic world. The wallpaper and curtains (each ushering you into a new room) are printed with pictures of diatoms with fabulous names. The wall when you enter is covered with pictures of microscopic objects, some man-made, some natural: some identifiable: some wholly alien – the stomach bones of a starfish, the curve of a fly’s cornea. The exhibition is an exploration of scale and our place in this universe: at once tiny and insignificant, and hopelessly huge and isolated from a fascinating and gorgeous microverse. ‘“The nebula’s terror when it thinks of the atom” – a line in one poem sums it all up. Prepare to feel clumsy, inept, and out of scale when you leave.  
The Book of Imaginary Science runs from 25^th September to 25^th November
Small Worlds runs from 31^st October to 6^th April
Entrance is free
http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/
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An open letter to Oxford University Dramatic Society from Oxford’s theatre-going audience:
Get over yourselves. 
Earlier this term, Cherwell stage editor Rob Morgan, in what is undoubtedly his job, decided to run reviews of most, but not all, of the plays showing in Oxford that week. The following Friday, in what was undoubtedly not their job, members of the cast of Guardians and key OUDS officers criticized Morgan in a letter to the editor, accusing him of leaving their play out because of its venue. Their argument was that their OUDS funding was a “greater guarantee of quality than venue”.
It’s hard to know where to begin on this one – one column is hugely insufficient. Luckily, Thespionage has done half my job by mocking the ridiculous display of ego involved. Both student papers should be able to agree on one thing: OUDS does not get to dictate content. As long as there are more shows in Oxford than can be reviewed on a single page, there will be only one way to influence what’s in either paper – applying for a job.
But the Guardians’ letter raises another question: what, actually, is the point of student theatre?
Angels in America was said to be “the closest Oxford drama comes to professional quality”. Very well, but is getting close to professional quality really what Oxford drama should be striving for? Last year Naomi Hirst pointed out on Toast, “Oxford drama entirely mystifies the concept of supply and demand.” It’s true: we are oversupplied for our theatre needs. That’s fine. We’re also over-saturated in music, dance, debating, and (dare I say it?) newspapers.
We have so many plays not because we have massive audiences, but because we have so many actors. While watching most other student endeavours (like choirs) is free, I’ve spent £16 on theatre in the last couple of weeks. But just because I could have seen the RSC for less, does that mean Oxford drama should be striving for equal standards – and as a result, for an equally competitive and exclusive environment? I don’t think so. While showcase means some people do get professional quality training while they’re here, those fifteen people are not the point of student drama.
OUDS claims to have a purpose of cultivating relationships with drama societies and promoting a “cohesive dramatic body for its members”, It also claims to be dedicated to taking the odd risk and supporting a varied range of student drama. Which is great, when it works. Oscar Wood’s risky and original Big Breathe In was one of the few shows at Oxford worth the exorbitant ticket prices. But a brief glance over OUDS funding shows that most money ends up in not-exactly-daring plays involving “big names”. While Cuppers and New Writing are a good start, those who partake in them aren’t always supported after. In fact, it’s a challenge for a no-name show just to use the OUDS costume cupboard.
The mere fact that Thespionage exists is a nod to the fact that hackery has seeped from Frewin Court into the Madding Crowd. No-one is surprised to find that some lesser thesps who wrote asking for auditions for Angels in America never got responses, or that that there are unsavoury rumours about Macbeth’s casting. But while OUSU can fine you posters, and the Union ever-so-rarely remembers to call tribunals, OUDS hackery streams steadily on, unchecked, cultivating an air of exclusivity that keeps many aspiring actors distant and throws a long shadow over more “amateur” shows that struggle to get funds and audiences.    
What is OUDS? A mini-conservatory trying to produce polished, commercial shows while teaching our budding thesps to network just like professionals? Or a student society devoted to promoting wide involvement in varied, interesting theatre while giving students an outlet to try something new? It’s unclear what, if anything, their funding ‘guarantees’. Many hard-working casts have found their review cut, just as many aspirant producers have had their funding rejected and scads of talented actors have felt overlooked. As long as many of Oxford’s thesps feel excluded, OUDS darlings are bound to get upstaged by an outsider sometimes. You would hope they’d accept a chorus role with grace.

By Sarah Kent
John Kofi Agyekun Kufuor, President of Ghana, arrived at the Union with fully twenty dignitaries and journalists in tow. It was an impressive, dignified sight. Or at least it was until the President was shown into a private room. Then pandemonium broke loose; suddenly everyone was running up and down the halls of the union, scrutinising very carefully the pictures on the wall and shouting to each other, ‘is that ’61? Have you found ’61?’ This may seem like strange behaviour from fully grown politicians, but there was reason behind the madness. What they were looking for was a picture showing the members of the Union in 1961, a picture which features the President. I was soon running up and down the halls of the Union, in what can only be described as an ungainly manner, leading Ghanaian officials on a wild goose chase along the corridors. Luckily I was prevented from making a complete fool of myself by a call to meet the President.

I walk into the small room in the Union in which the President is being entertained and am immediately impressed. At 6 foot 3, a height that has lead to him being dubbed the Gentle Giant, Kufuor dominates the room, which he is clearly pleased to be in. For him this is not just a trip to Oxford, but a trip down memory lane.
Of course back in 1961, Oxford was a very different place; men’s and women’s colleges were separate and even the men’s colleges closed at 11pm. If you stayed out after that time you were stuck outside the gates for the night. Though the President did not tell me if he was ever left out in the cold without a bed, he did say that his bedroom was not always much more comfortable than the streets. “The rooms were not central heated, my bedroom had no heating system whatsoever and the sitting room had just a very small gas stove. The winter was savage, really savage and all I could do was get myself blankets, lots of blankets. I literally slept with my suit on.”

Pleasant though it is reminiscing, the President has not come to Oxford to be sentimental. He has come to talk about Africa. He is certainly qualified for the job. On a continent with many players, Ghana holds a central role. It was the first sub-Saharan colony in Africa to gain its independence in 1957, and is looked on as something as a role model for African states. It is a relatively stable country, having never experienced the civil wars or ethnic tensions so common in other African states. It also has a lot of potential; one of its primary exports is gold and a large oil field has recently been discovered. It could hardly be seen as short of natural resources. Indeed, Ghana is often hailed as one of Africa’s success stories.

All this sounds rather positive and President Kufuor is rightly proud of his country and the role he and his party have played in its development. Kufuor’s accession to the title of President in 2000 marked a landmark in Ghana’s history; it was the first peaceful handover of power in the country’s short lifespan. But Kufuor’s time is coming to an end. Next year sees another round of Presidential elections for which he will be unable to stand, having served the two terms allowed him by the constitution. He seems content with this. In a country where the smooth and peaceful passage of power is looked on not only as a constitutional demand but as a normal occurrence this may seem unimportant, but it is clearly something the President wishes to emphasise. When I ask him how he feels about having to step down next year he answers firmly, “I entered knowing my time would be up and I tried very hard to use my time productively for the country, and I believe I chalked some successes, and I believe when the time is up I’ll step down.” In England this may sound like stating the obvious, but in Africa, where heads of state frequently ignore the constitution in order to maintain power, this is an admirable statement.

Of course, the President’s serenity about the changeover may have a lot to do with his confidence in his party. Any suggestions that the opposition party may be making a comeback he poo poos as media propaganda. As proof he cites his government’s many successes. “If you went down to the ground to meet people they will tell you of the dramatic economic successes of the government, you would also see the infrastructure in terms of roads, energy, education and healthcare delivery, so many things.” The statement explains his confidence and seems impressive but a little too positive. Charming and earnest though the President appears, it is perhaps not only the opposition who have engaged with the media for its own purposes.

Whatever he maintains, Kufuor’s image is not squeaky clean. Although his government stands on a platform of ‘zero tolerance for corruption’, he has been accused of exactly that, and particularly of nepotism. Yet the President doggedly denies such accusations. When I ask him about it he is quick to defend himself, stating definitively “This is not true.” Of course, he cannot deny that his brother is the Minister of Defence and many of his in-laws hold prominent positions in the government, but the President is quick to defend himself on this count. He explains, “My direct brother, a very brilliant man, a very accomplished man, has been a parliamentarian since before I came to power and I believe he is qualified to be a member of parliament; my brother-in-law, perhaps the most senior politician in Ghana today. He contested me for the candidacy of our party to be president. If you take these two out I do not have a family member in the cabinet.” This sounds rehearsed but, sitting facing the President, his version of events is very compelling and I want to believe that he is the straight-down-the-line official he presents himself to be.

This is almost certainly a naïve hope, but one I’d rather maintain than go down the road of the cynic. Either way, before judgement is passed, Kufor’s presidency must be put in perspective. Corruption is practically a given in any world leader’s assent to power, yet equally it must be acknowledged that he is one of the least corrupt rulers in Africa at the moment. His policy of zero tolerance certainly seems to have been effective. Ghana is currently ranked a joint seventh alongside Egypt as one of the least corrupt countries in Africa on the Corruption Perceptions Index. Given the number of countries in Africa this status is impressive.

And this policy is not Kufuor’s only success. He has also been widely recognised, particularly in the international community, for the economic measures he has introduced in Ghana, many of which have involved increased international development, including the introduction in September of Ghanaian bonds, the first sold by a West African state. A further testament to the success of his economic policy is the award received by Ghana’s Finance Minister just last month from the World Bank, naming Ghana the Top Reforming African Country. But of course there is a downside to all this international recognition. The fact remains that Ghana is still a primarily subsistence agrarian economy and the injection of international money into the economy will not necessarily translate into development.

The problems Ghana faces in such ambitious plans were recently chrystalised in the country’s preparation for the 2008 Africa Cup, which Ghana will host. Two new stadiums had to be built for the event, and contracts were issued to a Chinese company. Immediately a problem arose. In order to complete the stadiums on schedule, the normal technology transfer in such projects – that is, the training and use of local workers – would have to be sacrificed, and sacrificed they were. But Kufuor seems sanguine about such problems. He sees international investment only as a result of internal growth and does not admit to any dangers in his policies.

Ghana is far from being a model country, and Kufuor follows suit. In terms of Africa, though, Ghana is a success story; in terms of politicians, Kufuor is earnest and, more importantly, successful.