Fangs a Lot

GHANA Fangs a Lot

"The soldiers now left in Flagstaff House, residence of the former President, are, I am told, eating their way through his private zoo," reported a columnist in West Africa magazine last month. Full details were hard to come by, but the report set correspondents and writers to speculation about what might be going on in the cages of Kwame Nkrumah's private zoo.

Somehow the old eland was missing. Neither hide nor hair of him had been seen since the day that Kwame Nkrumah had been ostrichized, accused of being the biggest cheetah in Ghana, but safaris anyone knew, no fowl play was involved.

First sign that anything was cooking at Flagstaff House came when Lieut. General Joseph Ankrah got on the horn and was told by the operator: "I'm sorry, the lion is busy." "Rhino what you're up to," he roared, with the phone still Ringling in his ears, "but I don't know vulture doing it for." In a frightful stew, Ankrah headed for the waterfront zoo (known as Hyenasport) for an on-the-spots investigation.

The bear facts, as Ankrah herd them, suggested that the garrison had been reluctant at first about eating up the zoo. But hesitation quickly gave way to hunger, and it soon became a matter of gibbon take. For the first time they could remember, the ill-paid troops at Flagstaff House were all in plover.

To some, of course, it was spoor sportsmanship, killing defenseless animals and all, but Nkrumah had made chimps of his soldiers too long, and they had lots of bones to pick. The animals, they decided, were fair game. So while Nkrumah sat in Conakry, turning himself into a Guinea pig and pondering whether he should pack his trunk and join his friend Nasser at his Nile perch, the boared soldiers decided what they needed was some good gnus. One night when they were all croc-ed, they turned the zoo into Nkrumah's Bar & Gorilla.

It was aardvark. One apprentice cook was kept beesy making hamster sandwiches, but he won no kudus for his efforts: the troops were looking for fancier fare, such as peppered leopard or antelope with cantaloupe. The troops washed down their meals with giraffes of wine, and afternoon visitors to Flagstaff House were offered tea and simba-thigh, followed by lemon meringue python.

By the time Ankrah arrived on the scene, the zoo was nearly empty. Why hadn't someone phoned to inform him? he growled. "We orangutang but ewe did not answer," the zookeeper replied tsetsely. After a halfhearted tour of the cages, he returned to headquarters, sank wearily into a chair and, realizing it was too late to save the animals, told the garrison commander to allow his troops to continue the feast. "As a matter of fact," said Ankrah, "as long as you're up, get me a Grant's gazelle."

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