Ghana’s masked man reveals tactics behind unorthodox presidential bid

After weeks of intense speculation about the identity of the anonymous presidential contender whose masked image appeared on billboards across Ghana, the mystery candidate finally revealed himself.

But Nana Kwame Bediako, a freewheeling businessman who previously hit the headlines for importing a pair of tiger cubs, insisted his man-in-the-mask act that garnered headlines around the world was anything but a gimmick.

“I feel like I’m following the vision of people like Kwame Nkrumah,” Bediako said, referring to Ghana’s liberation hero, a pan-African icon. “They didn’t have a political party at the beginning, they just had a movement,” the 43-year-old said in his first unmasked interview with foreign media.

Bediako’s emergence highlights an openness in Ghana, one of Africa’s most stable democracies, to look beyond the two main parties that have held sway for decades. “Ghanaian politics is in a sad state,” said Valerie Labi, who heads an e-mobility start-up in Accra, the capital. “The people have lost trust and the political class are out of touch. The man in the mask is just the beginning.”

Without the disguise, Bediako is a familiar face to Ghanaians. He is best known for parlaying his scrap metal and nightclub business into a mini property empire. He also had a brush with the authorities in 2022 after bringing the two tigers from Dubai. When they grew too big to be kept at his home, he built a zoo in Accra to accommodate them.

Bediako said he launched his presidential bid behind a mask because of the object’s power in African history to scare and confuse an enemy. “If there’s a man wearing a mask, you have to wait for me to unveil and find out I’m going to challenge you,” he said of his tactics. “We were controlling the media space without buying media space,” he said of his campaign, named The New Force.