The flag of Ghana

Ghana

Ghana , officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country located in West Africa. It is bordered by Côte d'Ivoire to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, Togo to the east, and the Gulf of Guinea to the south...

was designed to replace the flag of the United Kingdom

Flag of the United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland uses as its national flag the royal banner known as the Union Flag or, popularly, Union Jack. The current design of the Union Flag dates from the union of Ireland and Great Britain in 1801...

 upon attainment of independence in 1957. It was flown until 1959, and then reinstated in 1966. It consists of the Pan-African colours

Pan-African colours

Two different sets of three colours are referred to as the Pan-African colours: the red, green and gold first used in the flag of Ethiopia and Eritrea before the countries broke apart; and the red, green and black adopted by the American-based Universal Negro Improvement Association and African...

 of red, yellow, and green, in horizontal stripes, with a black five-pointed star in the centre of the gold stripe. The Ghanaian flag was the first Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

n flag after the flag of Ethiopia

Flag of Ethiopia

The flag of Ethiopia is a flag that was adopted on February 6, 1996. It conforms to the specifications set forth in article 3 of the 1995 Constitution of Ethiopia. The three traditional colours date back to Emperor Menelik and were first used in a flag in 1897...

 to feature these colours.

The black star was adopted from the flag of the Black Star Line

Black Star Line

The Black Star Line was a shipping line incorporated by Marcus Garvey, organizer of the Universal Negro Improvement Association . The shipping line was supposed to facilitate the transportation of goods and eventually African Americans throughout the African global economy...

, a shipping line incorporated by Marcus Garvey

Marcus Garvey

Marcus Mosiah Garvey, Jr., ONH was a Jamaican publisher, journalist, entrepreneur, and orator who was a staunch proponent of the Black Nationalism and Pan-Africanism movements, to which end he founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League...

 that operated from 1919 to 1922., and gives the Ghana national football team

Ghana national football team

The Ghana national football team, popularly known as the Black Stars, is the national association football team of Ghana and is controlled by the Ghana Football Association...

 their nickname, the Black Stars.

The red represents the blood of those who died in the country's struggle for independence, the gold represents the mineral wealth of the country, the green symbolises the country's rich forests and natural wealth, and the black star stands for "the lodestar of African freedom".

The flag's design influenced that of the flag of Guinea-Bissau

Flag of Guinea-Bissau

The flag of Guinea-Bissau was adopted in 1973 when independence from Portugal was proclaimed.- History :Like the former flag of Cape Verde, the flag is based on that of the Partido Africano para a Independencia da Guine e Cabo Verde , still the dominant party in Guinea-Bissau...

 (1973).
The civil ensign

Civil ensign

The civil ensign is the national flag flown by civil ships to denote nationality...

 is a red flag

Red flag

In politics, a red flag is a symbol of Socialism, or Communism, or sometimes left-wing politics in general. It has been associated with left-wing politics since the French Revolution. Socialists adopted the symbol during the Revolutions of 1848 and it became a symbol of communism as a result of its...

 with the national flag in a black-fimbriated

Fimbriation

In heraldry and vexillology, fimbriation refers to small stripes of colour placed around common charges or ordinaries, usually in order for them to stand out from the background, but perhaps just because the designer felt it looked better, or for a more technical reason to avoid what would...

 canton

Flag terminology

Flag terminology is a jargon used in vexillology, the study of flags, to describe precisely the parts, patterns, and other attributes of flags and their display.-Description of standard flag parts and terms:...

.
The naval ensign is a red St.