Accra, Ghana was home to one of the most inclusive skatepark’s in Africa before the vibrant community of young skaters, creatives and eccentric people was crashed in 2023.
Sandy Alibo, a Caribbean woman, initiated the dream seven years ago with the intention of bridging the divide between Africans and the Black diaspora community.
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She chose to elevate board sports as a means of achieving this goal, and as a result, Surf Ghana, an organisation that promotes youth participation in skateboarding and surfing, was born.
In December 2021, the late Ghanaian-American fashion designer and entrepreneur, Virgil Abloh in collaboration with Daily Paper, Off-White, and Surf Ghana, brought the dream of opening Accra’s first skatepark to life.
Freedom Skatepark as it was known, served as a safe space for Ghanaian youth promoting creativity, inclusivity and community.
It was not long after U.S Vice President Kamala Harris and Kendrick Lamar visited the park, that things took an unfortunate turn for this amazing community of young people.
Ghana’s Freedom Skatepark was overrun on April 30 by a contractor and thirty labourers who demanded to erect a wall there.
The contractor claims that improper terms were used by the original landowner to lease the space to the Freedom SkatePark team. On that particular day, the skatepark authorities were able to lawfully hold them off.
The workmen returned on May 6, 2023, and reportedly used aggressive threats to succeed in building the wall.
A shiver of despair swept across Ghana’s young and cultural communities as the skatepark’s future looked gloomy.
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The land dispute doesn’t seem like it’s going to be over anytime soon and Accra’s vibrant urban community of creatives and skaters have been left in the dark.
