Muslim-led assembly in Aquinas chapel: Swallah, Fr. Ohene and Graphic article

"Aquinas ‘truth’ assembly: Swallah, Fr. Ohene and Junior Graphic" - Okay, so this was the other headline I wished to use but didn't, as if you care. 

Morning assembly at St. Thomas Aquinas was simply a routine with a template I can quite recall decades on. It would take place either in the chapel or in the open space between the chapel and the car park.

All things being equal, it will be led by a prefect – preferably the chapel prefect. Wherever it is held, the motions are almost the same except for Torgbor’s hymns – accompanied by his projector, conducting prowess and piano, when it was in the chapel.

As far as I could remember, there was the hymn (s), the recitation of Hail Mary, the school anthem, announcements – usually from prefects or Fr. Ohene or Batsa, in rare cases by other tutors – these were at the heart of the quotidian event.

I dare say that in so far as a Muslim could not be a chapel prefect, there was a remote if not impossible chance that a Muslim will ever lead assembly. The other possibility was that a prefect – who is Muslim – could find himself leading if the circumstances so played out.

But one fine morning in my Aquinas lifetime, it did happen that a Muslim led the gathering. Swallah Abdul Razak, one of our finest gentlemen in the 2003 batch, he also served as president of the Aquinas Muslim Students Association in our final year.

Evergreen Father Ohene (L), my AMSA president, Swallah Abdur Razak (R) 

That day, the session was to take place in the church. Swallah (then a form 2 student) with very little assistance from a chapel prefect (I think) went through the motions before going on to ‘preach’ about that which earned him the enviable record of being Muslim leading the assembly.

Swallah had authored an article published in the Junior Graphic. The article was titled: ‘Veritas Liberat,’ and it was for that exact reason that Father Benjamin Ohene had asked him to lead the assembly.

Swallah elaborated on the content of his article driving home the point that we had to in all matters stick to the truth. In that opinion piece, Swallah had succeeded in projecting a core value i.e. the motto, of Aquinas as a body corporate.

Of course, it was a motto that most boys did not necessarily live up to. The liars brigade extended from the content of the many letters and the refusal to turn in ‘criminal elements’ – for fear of being branded a chooker.

For us, the motto was ‘Veritas Liberat,’ meaning the truth shall set you free but the engine of the motto was ‘beeb3,’ for all it is worth we were nestled in Dadekotopon constituency. Speak truth, yes, but also see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil also seem to play a role.

Back to Swallah and Father Ohene: that a Muslim was allowed to conduct the assembly was yet another key signpost of the fact that we lived in and were brought up in a pragmatic and forward-thinking ambience.

As the school anthem said, Aquinas thought us to strive for perfection in three key areas – spirit, soul and body by praying to the Most High God. For those that strived, you did so with humility and doggedness – the anthem chose to call it steadfastness.

Aquinas at the time I was a resident was a perfect template for inter-religious co-existence and so it is that when I read and hear about places of religious strife, I have often said to myself, ‘only if I could pluck and place them in Cantonments, sanity will play out.’