Kwame Nkrumah Ideological Institute

The Kwame Nkrumah Ideological Institute of Economics and Political Science, also known as the Winneba ideological Institute, was an educational body in Winneba, 40 miles from Accra, Ghana. It was founded by Kwame Nkrumah, then Ghana's president, to promote socialism and the decolonization of Africa and, as Nkruham told a meeting of his Bureau of African Affairs in 1960, to be "an institute where selected dedicated members of all nationalist movements of Africa could be rigidly indoctrinated in the realism of African unity". He went on to say that "trainees should be made to realize the Party's ideology is a religion and should be carried out faithfully and fervently." Nkrumah was influenced by his Russian security advisers to use the institute as his selecting ground for future members of the Security Service; at the time, there were approximately 600 Ghanian students studying in the Soviet Union.

The stated purpose of the institute was: 1) To train Socialist Ghanaians capable of taking into their hands the key posts in all sectors of the apparatus of the state and the economy, and to take an active part in the Socialist People’s Party; (2) To train African freedom fighters in the spirit of the African revolution, Pan-Africanism and Socialism in such a way that when they return to their homelands they will be better armed to take an active part in liberating their countries from imperialism, colonialism and neo-colonialism; (3) To train Africans in the spirit of Pan-Africanism as a method of making progress toward an African union; (4) To train Africans in the spirit of Nkrumahism which is considered the development of Marxism in conditions and circumstances peculiar to Africa; and (5) To train Africans in the spirit of proletarian internationalism.

The institute consisted of the Ideological Education Training Centre and the Positive Action Training Centre. Its courses were designed to equip students with the ability to be active partners in the development of their communities, nation and continent. Workers could attend the institute for a short time to improve their skills, or take one of the two-year courses offered in such things as political science, economics, political institutions, African Studies and leadership.

In 1963, the institute had 210 students, with 77 enrolled in the two-year diploma course taught by eight staff members. By 1965, it had 550 students, including 250 full-time students, and 546 employees, including nine Ghanaian lecturers and 12 Eastern European lecturers who were appointed by the institute or Nkrumah's Convention People's Party (CPP). One former student was Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe

As the only ideological institute on the African continent, the school accepted "freedom fighters" from any liberation movement, although non-Ghanian students were required to be members of an organization fighting for independence. Most students were from Ghana, with the rest mainly coming from Nigeria, Senegal, and Somalia. In 1962, the institute housed 46 graduates of the Mankrong Camp–one of Nkrumah's secret guerrilla training camps, and taught students how to handle weapons and explosives. Public officers were given the option of attending while receiving full salary. As most of the population of Ghana still had no access to ideological education, 'study groups' were organized throughout the country and, in 1963, the Ministry of Education requested that all secondary schools and higher institutions begin incorporating ideological education into the curriculum.