COUNTRY BETRAYAL: “I still feel betrayed by my own country” — Quaynor opens up on painful Ghana experience

For a man who dedicated much of his career to building Ghana’s technology ecosystem, Professor Nii Narku Quaynor has one painful feeling he still carries.

Betrayal.

During his conversation with Kafui Dey, the veteran technology pioneer was asked directly whether he felt betrayed by his own country.

His answer was immediate.

“Yes.”

Then he went further.

“I still feel betrayed by my own country because I don’t think they understood what was going on.”

And, according to Quaynor, the feeling did not come from one isolated incident. It grew out of years of trying to introduce ideas that were far ahead of the environment around him, returning home after building a successful career in America, and then watching some of his work and institutions fail to receive the support or understanding he believed they deserved.

Quaynor had already established himself in the United States. He was a senior engineering manager, had about 60 people working under him and was building sophisticated multicomputer systems. He had resources, influence and a clear professional path.

But he returned to Ghana because he felt a responsibility to help build something at home.

“I was obsessed with the burden that if I didn’t, I’ll be asked, ‘Why didn’t you come and help?’” he explained.

That decision came with a heavy cost.

After returning, he encountered resistance and eventually lost NCS in 2003, the pioneering company he had built in Ghana. What hurt him most was not only that the company was shut down, but that some people appeared to celebrate its closure.

“There were people clapping,” he recalled.

He said they were celebrating because they did not understand what the company represented or what was being lost.

Quaynor also remembers the fate of the site where some of that pioneering work took place. The premises, which once housed a technology organization involved in early internet and media initiatives, are now being used for cement production.

“They’re making cement there now,” he said.

For him, that transformation represented more than the loss of a building. It symbolized what he saw as Ghana’s failure to recognize, protect and build on an important opportunity.

And, according to Quaynor, the problem has not completely disappeared.

“They still don’t understand what’s going on,” he said.

Kafui Dey was visibly struck by the admission.

“They still don’t?” he asked.

“They still don’t,” Quaynor replied.

For him, the issue is difficult to explain because much of the work he was doing was ahead of its time.

He pointed to his early computer science career and the fact that he earned his PhD in computer science in 1977.

“How do you understand a PhD in computer science from 1977?” he asked.

His answer was blunt.

“It’s difficult.”

Quaynor believes that unless someone was deeply involved in that world at the time, it was difficult to appreciate what he and others were trying to build.

That lack of understanding, combined with the resistance he faced after returning home and the loss of institutions he had worked to establish, is what appears to have deepened his sense of betrayal.

But despite the hurt, there was no bitterness in his response when asked whether he had forgiven those involved.

“Oh, they know not what they do,” he said.

Then he explained why forgiveness came relatively easily.

“Because I was playing the role of a pioneer, I could easily forgive people.”

He said it would have been harder if he believed people were deliberately trying to harm him.

“If I felt that they were doing it maliciously, it would have been difficult.”

But he came to another conclusion.

“In my thinking, they were doing it out of ignorance and out of self-interest. So it’s easy to forgive them.”

That answer reveals perhaps the most complicated part of Quaynor’s story.

He can forgive.

But he has not forgotten the sacrifices he made, the opportunities he believes were wasted or the lack of understanding he encountered in his own country.

And decades after his pioneering work, he says the feeling remains:

“I still feel betrayed by my own country.”