Nelson Mandela is not the long-serving political prisoner

Famous historian Yaw Anokye Frimpong has debunked claims that former South African President and anti-apartheid activist Nelson Mandela was the long-serving political prisoner.

According to him, the longest-serving political prisoner in Africa is the “Asantehene” Agyeman Prempeh.

Prempeh I’s original throne name was Kwaku Dua III. He ruled the Ashanti Empire from 1888 to 1896 and died on May 12, 1931.

Narrating the story of Agyemang Prempeh on the Max Morning Agenda in Accra on Wednesday, the legal practitioner explained that Governor William Maxwell imprisoned the Asantehene in 1896, which led the Ashanti Empire to be dissolved.

He said that Prempeh I was first detained in Cape Coast Castle; later, he was sent to Elmina Castle, then Freetown in Sierra Leone, before his final imprisonment at the Seychelles, the island where Nelson Mandela was also imprisoned.

Anokye Frimpong argued that though Mandela was a political prisoner, he was not the first political leader to serve the longest jail period in Africa.

He said Prempeh I was the first political prisoner to serve the longest jail period of 30 years, beating Mandela’s record of 28 years.

“Because Ghanaians fail to learn their history, they adopted the belief that Mandela is the political prisoner who served the longest jail period. That idea is fallacious. Prempeh is also a political prisoner who was imprisoned from 1896 to 1924. He beat the record of Mandela by two years,” Anokye Frimpong emphasized.

Charity, he stated, begins at home and expresses the need for Ghanaians to learn more in order not to be swayed by others narration as far as history is concerned.

Anokye Frimpong maintained that Ghana is holding the record of the “longest-served political prisoner and not the South African.”

Source: Ghana/MaxTV/MaxFM/max.com.gh/Joyceline Natally Cudjoe