Government’s deadline for bondholders to sign onto the domestic debt exchange programme expires today, Monday, January 16, 2023.
In its quest to address the country’s ongoing economic challenges, the government launched the programme to invite holders of bonds to voluntarily exchange approximately GH¢137 billion domestic notes and bonds of the Republic including ESLA and Daakye for a package of new bonds.
It is currently unclear how many institutions and individuals have signed onto the programme.
The domestic debt exchange program since its announcement has faced huge opposition from labour groups which managed to get pension funds exempted.
Also, individual bondholders who were included following the exemption of pension funds have taken a strong stance against their inclusion.
The situation has put government in a tight corner as it races against time to secure an IMF Board approval for a three billion dollar bailout.
A former Students Representative Council (SRC) President of the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), Joseph Osei Mensah, has threatened to sue his alma mater.
According to the 2018/19 SRC president, the school has failed to implement the recommendations of a committee that investigated him on grounds of embezzlement.
In a report by Myjoyonline.com, Osei Mensah accused the school of dragging its feet following his exoneration by the ad-hoc committee some three years ago.
He is wondering why the school has failed to clear his name after the allegation of financial impropriety caused his reputation to be muddied.
He is thus asking the school to take full steps to restore his reputation and that of the members of his administration lest he commences legal action against the school.
“I and the other executives have been very much affected by these baseless accusations.
“Unfortunately, Management, by all indications, has refused to publish the retraction and apology, which was the final recommendation to be implemented from their own Committee’s report.
“This, I find as a total disregard to us the persons involved. Hence, a court action might be the next option within the shortest possible time”, the former SRC President stated.
Joseph Osei Mensah and his executives, during the 2018/19 academic year, were accused by the then Dean of Students, Prof. Anthony Mawuli Sallar, of embezzling GH₵70,000 prior to the end of their tenure in office.
As a result of the accusation, the school withheld the former SRC president’s certificate pending investigations into the matter.
Other executives who were affected by the accusation were the SRC Vice President, Kwadwo Yeboah Darkwah; the SRC Treasurer, Felix Kwasi Donkor; the SRC PRO, Jeffred Okoe Aryeetey; the Finance Committee Chairman, Emmanuel Ashaley Djanie and the Chairman for the Social Planning Committee, Bright Ayi Junior.
However, an independent investigation conducted by the succeeding administration found Mr Osei Mensah and his colleagues innocent of the accusations.
As a result of the findings, the students’ leadership issued a press statement on February 4, 2020, to clear the former SRC president of the allegations stating that the SRC’s finances were intact and there was no embezzlement as reported by the then Dean of Students.
The management of the school, unsatisfied by the SRC’s findings, also set up an ad hoc committee led by Professor Philip Osei Duku, the then Deputy Rector with other members to probe the matter further.
Other members of the committee included the then Secretary of GIMPA, Julius Atukpui (retired); Head of the Department for Public School, Dr Lord Yevugah Mawuko; Director of Finance, James Abrah, and Charity Hayford, who served as Secretary to the Committee.
The committee after three months of investigation submitted its report which exonerated the accused and recommended the immediate release of all withheld academic certificates, payment of some GH₵16,717 as outstanding due them, as well as a publication of retraction and apology to clear their names in the unfortunate reportage.
Despite the recommendations by the committee, the school has only released a sum of GH₵16,717 on 18th August, 2020 due the SRC administration under his tenure following persistent pressure from his lawyers.
He is however demanding full implementation of the recommendation including a release clearing his name and that of his colleagues.
“It is important to note that the recommendations as captured in the Committee’s report, was further tabled at the Central Administration Committee of the Institute, chaired by then Rector, Prof. Phillip Bondzi-Simpson and was further affirmed, which gave the Secretary of the Institute the green light to proceed with the full implementation of the Committee’s recommendations. “Unfortunately, close to almost three years, the Management of GIMPA has failed to faithfully carry out the full implementation of the recommendations”, he lamented.
“The school has however released the certificates of the accused,” he stated.
A national organiser aspirant of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the just-ended national delegate congress, Henry Osei Akoto, has disagreed with a stalwart of the party on John Dramani Mahama’s achievements in the Volta Region.
In an earlier interview monitored by GhanaWeb, Dr. Obed Asamoah said that President Mahama didn’t do anything for the region, which is considered the powerhouse of the NDC.
This, he added, was responsible for the low numbers that the NDC received in the 2020 election, as compared to earlier feats by the founder of the NDC, Jerry John Rawlings, and President John Evans Atta Mills.
Dr. Obed Asamoah also blamed the former president for the NDC’s inability to retain the Hohoe seat, which, for the first time, was won by the New Patriotic Party’s John Peter Amewu.
But the 2020 parliamentary candidate for the Oforikrom Constituency, Henry Osei Akoto, has disagreed with the former Attorney General.
In a post shared on social media rebutting the claims of the law luminary and politician, Henry Osei Akoto stated that John Mahama undertook hundreds of projects in the party’s nationally acclaimed “world bank.”
“Respectfully, in response to my senior comrade, Dr. Obed Asamoah, about Mahama not doing anything for Volta, I beg to differ.
“John Dramani Mahama as president did over 30 projects under health, over 129 under education, about 60 projects in the transport sector, 16 projects in the ICT sector, and many other countless projects in different sectors.
“Any doubting Thomas can provide evidence to the contrary!” he wrote.
He further provided a list of the projects cutting across the transport, health, education, ICT, and many other sectors of the economy.
Dr. Nyaho Nyaho-Tamakloe, a leading member of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has said that a close family member of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo told him that the current happenings in the country are not ordinary.
Speaking in a JoyNews interview monitored by GhanaWeb, Dr Nyaho-Tamakloe said that the problems the president is facing in governing the country have spiritual connotations.
“He (the family relation) said, “Doc what is happening to your brother (Akufo-Addo)?” And I said I don’t know; you are there with him.
“And his conclusion to me was that he thinks what is going on now is spiritual. This is exactly what he told me just some few days ago,” he said.
The statesman said that if the president or the country is under a spiritual attack “then we have to sit up properly.”
“Because some of the things that Nana Addo does, I don’t understand them, honestly,” he added.
The statesman said that he will for now withhold the identity of the family member but will disclose it in the future.
The Member of Parliament for the North Tongu constituency in the Volta Region, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has downplayed the possibility of President Nana Akufo-Addo completing the National Cathedral project before his tenure ends in 2024.
President Nana Akufo-Addo has on various occasions stated his willingness to complete the project despite the economic crisis and criticisms.
In a meeting with the Clergy at the Jubilee House on Monday, January 9, President Akufo-Addo said no matter what happens he will remain resolute and ensure that the National Cathedral gets to a very advanced stage before the end of his tenure.
But speaking on the Eyewitness News on Thursday, Okudzeto Ablakwa said the lack of progress on the project in the past ten months is an indication that it cannot be completed before the president’s tenure ends.
“Is this the time to do this, we are rushing to do this in four years, we are making history and it is the wrong history. The Washington national cathedral was built within 82 years. The Milan cathedral was more than 500 years. The Italians took their time, in periods of drought and economic hardship they took their time.
“This month is 10 months since the contractors left the site so when I hear the president screaming that we will build it, it is laughable, anybody familiar with this project knows that it is not possible.”
A fuel tanker containing 54,000 litres of petrol with registration number GT 8109-19 has gone missing.
According to Adom FM, the tanker was heading towards Kumasi when it was intercepted it at Okanta, near Nsawam by a gentleman who identified himself as a police officer.
The said officer tried to stop the tanker at Okanta but the driver who was descending a hill refused to stop.
The police officer then joined a taxi cab with some 3 other persons and chased after the tanker. After stopping them, the tanker driver and his mate were ordered to park the tanker and join the other persons in the taxi to the police station while the police officer remained at the scene.
NADMO Officer for Ayensuano, Nana Minta Snr disclosed on Adom Fm’s Dwaso Nsem that, “when the Police stopped the tanker, the tanker driver suggested that he parks the tanker and close the doors so that he can go with them to the Police station. The officer however told the driver to get into the taxi and that he will personally drive the tanker and follow them”.
According to the NADMO Officer, the taxi made a turn after the tanker driver and his mate sat in and headed back to an illegal checkpoint created by the said police officer at Okanta, where they were tied up by the taxi driver and the other persons in the car.
“the tanker driver and his conductor were left tied up at the checkpoint till some residents came across them this morning and untied them. They then took them to Teacher Mante Police Station. The driver and his conductor then took a taxi to the scene where they parked the tanker only to find it missing,” Nana Minta Snr added.
He also added that, neither the identity of the said person who was dressed in the police uniform nor that of the taxi driver is known.
The NADMO Officer narrated, “the act was done by one Police Officer who was in police uniform and was holding an AK 47 fire arm. The tanker driver and his mate couldn’t make out his name due to the dark; he didn’t mention his name to the driver. The driver said that, if not for the fact that he was holding the gun, he wouldn’t have stopped. So the gun he was holding was what made him stop, not knowing they are armed robbers.”
He added that, the case is currently at Ayensuano Teacher Mante Police Station. He also disclosed the tanker driver’s name as Isaac Abban and added that, they are currently at the police station but the whereabouts of the tanker is still not known.
He however stated that, he has been told a tracker is installed on the tanker so they have informed the owner about the incident and they are trying to track the tanker to find the location.
There is genius in simplicity, which makes the Band-Aid one of the most brilliant inventions in human history. A little adhesive tape, some cotton — and voila! The world is suddenly better.
Band-Aids are so ubiquitous and trusted today that it’s hard to imagine the planet or a medicine cabinet without them.
Yet they are a fairly recent addition to home and professional health care — invented only a century ago by a Johnson & Johnson employee named Earle Dickson.
MEET THE AMERICAN WHO INVENTED THE TV REMOTE CONTROL: SELF-TAUGHT CHICAGO ENGINEER EUGENE POLLEY
He wasn’t an inventor. He was a cotton buyer for the New Jersey company. And apparently he was one of the all-time great husbands as well.
“In 1917, Dickson married Josephine Frances Knight,” writes the Lemelson-MIT Program, an inventors’ think tank at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Earle Dickson was a newlywed in about 1920 when he conceived an idea to treat common household nicks and cuts. Johnson & Johnson then introduced his innovation as the Band-Aid in 1921. (Courtesy Johnson & Johnson)
“He quickly realized that his new bride seemed to constantly be nicking her fingers while working in the kitchen, and he thought the big bandages he was using to help her treat them were too large and clumsy.”
He found inspiration right there in his own home.
“Earle took two Johnson & Johnson products — adhesive tape and gauze — and combined them to make the first adhesive bandage,” writes Johnson & Johnson company historian Margaret Gurowitz.
Band-Aids are a low-tech invention, which makes their recent addition to our lives all the more surprising.
Transformative technologies such as the automobile, the miracle of flight and the seemingly impossible feat of transatlantic radio communication were all pioneered two decades or more before the Band-Aid.
Put another way: People could communicate instantly between New York City and London before they could stick a bandage on a bloody finger.
Dickson’s clever effort to comfort his wife would soon have an identity.
Brand-new product
Johnson & Johnson embraced Dickson’s idea — and dubbed the product the Band-Aid. The brilliant brand name is credited to factory superintendent W. Johnson Kenyon, according to a report by The Kiplinger Magazine in 1964.
Band-Aids hit the market in 1921, peddled at drugstores by traveling salesmen for Johnson & Johnson.
A vintage Johnson & Johnson Band-Aid box. The product was introduced in 1921. (James Keyser/Getty Images)
The generic term is adhesive bandages. Yet North Americans, and other people around the world, know them by the brand name Band-Aids.
In the United Kingdom, adhesive bandages are known generically as plasters; the European equivalent of the Band-Aid is the Elastoplast.
Band-Aids have been such a success that the term is used in everyday conversation in American English in place of adhesive bandages — so that the public sees no distinction between the two.
“His success resulted in the first commercial dressing for small wounds that consumers could apply with ease.”
It’s very much the way we refer to tissues as Kleenex or cotton swabs as Q-Tips.
Whatever they’re called, Dickson’s innovation dramatically improved first aid forever.
“Dickson created a prototype of cotton gauze and adhesive strips covered with crinoline that could be peeled off to expose the adhesive, easily allowing the gauze and strip to be wrapped over a cut,” writes the National Inventors Hall of Fame.
“His success resulted in the first commercial dressing for small wounds that consumers could apply with ease, and created a market that continues to thrive today.”
‘Piece of rag around the cut’
Earle Ensign Dickson was born on Oct. 10, 1892 in Grandview, Tennessee, to Dr. Richard Ensign and Minnie (Hester) Dickson.
The dad was a physician from western Massachusetts; the mom hailed from Connecticut. Earle Dickson was an only child after losing his younger brother Mark in infancy, according to U.S. Census records.
An individual holds a Band-Aid box during the BAND-AID’s Fashion Week Glamulance on Sept. 8, 2011, in New York City. (Kris Connor/Getty Images for Band-Aid)
The New Englanders made their way to Tennessee at some point, though Dickson lived for most of his life in Highland Park, New Jersey, where he found work at Johnson & Johnson sometime around World War I.
Despite massive advancements in battlefield medicine in the Civil War, Dickson was born into a world of primitive household bandaging — largely unchanged for centuries.
“Most people just used what they had in the house, which many times meant tying a piece of rag around the cut.” — J&J historian Margaret Gurowitz
“People needing a small bandage had to make one themselves, and they were often too cumbersome to be easily applied by one person,” Johnson & Johnson historian Gurowitz claims.
“Most people just used what they had in the house, which many times meant tying a piece of rag around the cut.”
The medical community had in previous decades made new efforts to improve home bandage care.
Earle Dickson invented a new form adhesive bandage, now known as the Band-Aid, at his home in Highland Park, New Jersey. He was inspired to treat his wife, Josephine, who suffered from household nicks and cuts. (Illustration by Chris Hsu from “The Boo-Boos That Changed the World” by Barry Wittenstein. Used by permission of Charlesbridge. )
“In 1845 Horace H. Day patented a surgical plaster composed of natural rubber and resin coated on cloth,” according to the “Encyclopedia of Modern Everyday Inventions” by David J. Cole, Eve Browning and Fred. E.H. Schroeder.
“Through the 19th century various tapes using natural (uncured) rubber were devised … None of these were aseptic or antiseptic.”
MEET THE AMERICAN WHO INSPIRED THE NATION IN TWO WORLD WARS: CHRISTIAN SOLDIER SGT. ALVIN YORK
Few doctors, the authors note, were ready to adopt the germ theory pioneered by English physician Joseph Lister.
This doctor would soon lend his name to a popular antiseptic mouthwash still in use today: Listerine. Dr. Lister would also inspire the creation of one of the world’s largest companies: Johnson & Johnson.
Earle Dickson was the right man at the right time with the right product — and working for the right company.
“An American, Robert Wood Johnson, heard Lister speak in 1876 and thought of preparing a commercial line of germ-free surgical dressings,” write Cole, Browning and Schroeder.
“Nine years later he formed a partnership with his two brothers and began manufacturing in New Brunswick, New Jersey, incorporating as Johnson & Johnson in 1887.”
Earle Dickson was the right man at the right time with the right product — and working for the right company.
Johnson & Johnson introduced the Band-Aid in 1921. Its creator, Earle Dickson, filed a patent for his “surgical dressing” on Dec. 29, 1925, and received the patent on Dec. 28, 1926. (U.S. Patent and Trademark Office)
“Johnson & Johnson was already a popular manufacturer of large cotton and gauze bandages for hospitals and soldiers when Dickson offered up his Band-Aid solution,” reports Lemelson-MIT, adding that Band-Aids first struggled to stick.
“The original handmade bandages did not sell well; only $3,000 worth of the product was sold during their first year. This may have been because the first versions of the bandages came in sections that were 2-1/2 inches wide and 18 inches long.”
People had to cut off the length of bandage needed to cover the wound. It was clumsy by today’s standards.
Boy Scouts frequently suffered the exact kind of injuries, minor scrapes, cuts and abrasions that Band-Aids best cured.
Improvements quickly followed. Machine-made Band-Aids of various sizes were introduced in 1924. Sterilized bandages hit the market in 1939. A sheer-vinyl version was introduced in 1958.
But it would take brilliant marketing employing America’s cut and scrape-prone children to make the Band-Aid a cultural phenomenon.
America’s kids embrace Band-Aids
Johnson & Johnson found an army of young American adventurers to prove their product out in the field.
They were the Boy Scouts of America. They frequently suffered the exact kind of injuries, minor scrapes, cuts and abrasions that Band-Aids best cured.
Johnson & Johnson helped popularize Band-Aids in the 1920s by sending them out in the field in first-aid kits for the Boy Scouts of America. The original 1925 “Boy Scout First Aid Packet” had a triangular bandage for a sling, a compress and two safety pins. It came in a cardboard container. (Boy Scouts of America)
“In the 1920s, the company began distributing, for free, an unlimited supply of Band-Aids to Boy Scout troops across the country,” Scouting Magazine reported in 2018.
“Band-Aids also were included in the custom first-aid kits Johnson & Johnson produced for the Boy Scouts of America. The kits were designed to help Boy Scouts earn merit badges like First Aid. The original 1925 ‘Boy Scout First Aid Packet’ contained a triangular bandage for a sling, a compress and two safety pins. It came in a simple cardboard container.”
Band-Aids found an international audience when they traveled overseas by the tens of millions with U.S. troops in World War II.
A more advanced Boy Scouts first-aid kit came in tin cans. The Girl Scouts were armed with Johnson & Johnson Band-Aids in 1932.
Band-Aids found an international audience when they traveled overseas by the tens of millions with U.S troops in World War II. Their service for Allied armed forces furthered the Band-Aid’s visibility and popularity.
MEET THE AMERICAN WHO INVENTED THE CRASH TEST DUMMY, A LIFE-SAVING INNOVATION
Band-Aids became a part of bedtime reading after the war, in one of the most successful children’s books in U.S. history.
“Doctor Dan the Bandage Man,” from Little Golden Books in 1950, tells the tale of a boy named Dan whose “boo-boo” is bettered by a mom when she applies a Band-Aid to his finger.
Transformed by the healing powers of the Band-Aid, Dan spends the rest of the book wheeling the bandages around in his wagon healing neighborhood pals, pets and even toys.
“Doctor Dan the Bandage Man” was published by Little Golden Books in 1950. It featured a boy named Dan who treated local children, pets and toys with Band-Aids. The book came with six Band-Aids and sold millions of copies — helping to popularize the Johnson & Johnson product. (Penguin Random House)
“The book came with six real Band-Aid Brand Adhesive Bandages — attached inside and advertised on the cover — so that kids could bandage their own hurt toys, should the need arise,” Gurowitz writes.
The publisher printed 1.75 million copies of the book in its first edition alone — putting a total of 10.5 million Band-Aids in the hands of American boys and girls.
Dickson’s Band-Aid had already proven itself perhaps the most successful home care product in history. Now it entered the realm of pop-culture icon.
The book was added to the Smithsonian collection at the National Museum of American History, which recognizes the book for its “innovative” display and marketing techniques.
“Simon and Schuster paired with Johnson & Johnson to promote the latter’s brand-name ‘Band-Aids’ and targeted one of its likeliest consumers, children,” the museum notes.
Johnson & Johnson helped popularize Band-Aids by packing them in first-aid kits for Boy Scouts. After an initial kit came in a simple cardboard box, Johnson & Johnson debuted an upgraded BSA first-aid kit in a tin box. Inside, scouts found burn and antibiotic creams, first-aid instructions and several kinds of bandages, including Band-Aids. (Boy Scouts of America)
“Boys and girls would sport Band-Aids in colorful shapes of stars, hearts, circles and flowers from samples included in the pages of the book, all the while learning the basics of first aid.”
Dickson’s Band-Aid had already proven itself perhaps the most successful home care product in history. Now it entered the realm of pop-culture icon.
The Band-Aid Bench
Earle Dickson died in Ontario, Canada, on Sept. 21, 1961. He was 68 years old.
After his breakthrough contribution to the company, Dickson spent the rest of his professional career working for Johnson & Johnson.
Earle Dickson was born in Tennessee on Oct. 10, 1892. A cotton buyer for Johnson & Johnson, he invented the Band-Aid in his Highland Park, New Jersey, home in 1921. Dickson died in Kitchener, Ontario, on Sept. 21, 1961. (Courtesy Johnson & Johnson)
“Johnson & Johnson eventually made Dickson a vice president at the company, a position in which he remained until his retirement in 1957,” writes MIT-Lemelson.
“He was also a member of the board of directors until his death in 1961. At the time of his death, Johnson & Johnson was selling over $30,000,000 worth of Band-Aids each year.”
MEET THE AMERICAN WHO INVENTED THE CRASH TEST DUMMY, A LIFE-SAVING INNOVATION
The success of Dickson’s product is hard to fathom.
Johnson & Johnson today produces 10 million Band-Aids every day — about 117 bandages each second.
Yet Band-Aids have gone far beyond just a “product.” They’re part of the wider cultural lexicon.
Band-Aid inventor Earle Dickson lived in Highland Park, New Jersey. The community installed a Band-Aid bench on South Fourth Avenue in 2019 in Dickson’s honor. Local artist JoAnn Boscarino created it. (Highland Park Arts Commission)
“Put a Band-Aid on it” or “Band-Aid solution” are common refrains to describe a short-term fix to a problem.
The British charity ensemble group Band Aid formed in the 1980s to give the world the holiday classic “Do They Know It’s Christmas.” Band Aid inspired Live Aid, the international pop-culture sensation charity concert of 1985.
Johnson & Johnson today produces 10 million Band-Aids every day — about 117 bandages every second.
The Band-Aids were the name given to the rock-and-roll groupies by writer/producer Cameron Crowe in the movie and stage versions of “Almost Famous.”
Highland Park, New Jersey, celebrated its hometown medical-inventor hero in 2019, introducing a memorial to Dickson known locally as the “Band-Aid bench.” Local artist JoAnn Boscarino designed it.
It sits on South Fourth Avenue, about two blocks from the Dicksons’ former home on Montgomery Avenue.
“We’re really proud that Highland Park is known as the birthplace of the Band-Aid,” town councilman Matthew Hersh told Fox News Digital.
The new Band Aid 20 CD single “Do They Know It’s Christmas,” at HMV in London’s Oxford Street. (Peter Jordan – PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images)
“It fits perfectly with our legacy of health care innovation.”
Highland Park, he noted, has spawned other great contributions to the world of science and health care.
The community was home to Selman Waksman, who won the 1952 Nobel Prize in Medicine for discovering antibodies to battle tuberculosis; and Arno Allen Penzias, who won the 1978 Nobel Prize in Physics for research that helped establish the Big Bang Theory.
“We’re proud of Highland Park’s history as a witness to innovation in health care and progress,” Hersh said. “We’re proud of Earle Dickson.”
Julia Roberts, one of most recognizable names on the planet, is not actually Julia Roberts. Introducing… Julia Mitchell?
The Pretty Woman star appeared in Ancestry’s Finding Your Roots with Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. where she found out (along with the rest of us) that her great-great grandfather could not possibly be a Roberts. Gates Jr. laid out the research he found regarding Julia’s family tree.
Julia’s great-grandfather, John Pendleton Roberts, was born in 1878 as noted in Georgia’s 1880 census. He lived with his mother — Julia’s great-great grandmother — named Rhoda Suttle Roberts. (The 55-year-old Oscar winner noted she had never heard of Rhoda before.) However, John’s father is “missing” in any official records.
In the 1850s, Rhoda married a man named Willis R. Roberts — the surname Julia now carries — but he passed away in 1964, “over a decade before” Rhoda gave birth to Julia’s great-grandfather.
“Julia, Willis Roberts cannot possibly be your great-great grandfather,” said Gates Jr. “He was dead.”
“But wait. Am I not a Roberts?” asked the actress.
Gates Jr. said there are no records in Douglas County listing John’s father. Julia and one of her father’s first cousins submitted DNA samples and Ancestry matched them to another descendant thanks to publicly available databases.
“In the end, we found a cluster of matches that tied Julia and her cousin to one man,” revealed Gates Jr. Julia then read the name aloud: “Henry McDonald Mitchell Jr.”
“You just read the name of your biological great-great grandfather,” said Gates Jr.
“So, we’re Mitchells?” asked Julia.
“You’re Julia Mitchell,” confirmed Gates Jr., which caused Julia to erupt in laughter. “You are not a Roberts biologically.”
Looking back at the 1880 census, Gates Jr. theorized why Rhoda didn’t divulge who John’s father was: Mitchell Jr. is listed as living with his wife, a woman named Sarah, and their six kids. Mitchell Jr. lived a few miles from Rhoda and his mother lived just four houses down from her.
“Sarah was probably saying, ‘Oh, you’re going to see your mom that’s so sweet!’” quipped Julia.
“On the one hand, my mind is blown and it is fascinating. And on the other hand, there’s part of me that when I’m calmer, you know, can still wrap my arms around the idea that my family is my family,” added the actress.
Julia then laughed, “And I do prefer the name Roberts! Yeah, this was a very unexpected turn.”
Watch Julia Roberts learn she’s not actually a Roberts
Between theNational Democratic Congress (NDC) and the New Patriotic Party (NPP), to be politically accepted on any regional level in the country, is a big deal.
But even more specific and significant for these two leading political parties in the country are what kind of numbers or voter turnouts they religiously receive from these regions, collectively.
As is widely known or accepted, the people of the Volta Region have historically always warmed up towards the NDC more, just as the Ashanti Region does for the NPP.
In more specific terms, these regions have become unconventionally known as the ‘world banks’ of these political parties. And rightly so, they have been for many years.
For instance, in the Ashanti Region, out of the 46 constituencies in the region, the NDC currently only has 4 seats to its name. That number has remained the highest number of seats the NDC has had in the region since 1996.
In the Volta Region, until 2020, the NPP had never won a seat. Currently, the tally is 17 to 1 seat in the region for the NDC and the NPP respectively. Previously, since 1996, the NDC had always won all the seats in the region (16 seats in 1996, 15 seats in 2000, 15 seats in 2004, 15 seats in 2008, 18 seats in 2012, and 18 seats in 2016).
Let us not forget also that the founding fathers of both the NDC and the NPP have formed a great part of why there is such a voting pattern for their parties in both the Volta and Ashanti Regions. Jerry John Rawlings of the NDC hails from the Volta Region, while the Danquah-Dombo-Busia trio of the NPP are predominantly from the Ashanti Region.
Could the narrative be taking an interesting twist, or turn, or direction? Well, it may depend on how you take a look at it.
And it would have been a fairer assessment if this was with respect to both regions but interestingly, the bus seems to be stopping more with the Volta Region.
It all started with the conversations on who has done what, and who has done more or not for the region. Ordinarily, that should have been an easy pass for the NDC, who are more preferred in the region, but some questions have arisen on whether or not they actually deserve such a comfortable acclamation.
What exactly did Mahama do for Volta Region? – Obed Asamoah asks:
As the NDC, just as the NPP, prepares to elect a new flagbearer to lead it into the 2024 general elections, a leading member of the National Democratic Congress, Dr Obed Yao Asamoah, has become one of the people to draw in this whole ‘what have you done for the Volta Region’ conversation.
He has asked for answers from former President John Dramani Mahama on exactly what he has done for the Volta Region.
He questioned what the 2020 flagbearer of the party did for the region that is considered the stronghold of their party, while he was in political office, and for which reason he would seek their votes again to lead the NDC into election 2024.
According to Dr. Asamoah, Mahama’s failure to establish tangible developmental projects in the Volta Region resulted in residents voting against the NDC.
Supporting his claim, Dr. Obed Asamoah said the evidence can be seen from how much, in terms of numbers, the percentage of voter turnout from the region in the 2020 elections were, as compared to those of his predecessors; the late John Evans Atta Mills and the late Jerry John Rawlings.
“Vote Region is supposed to be the World Bank of the NDC. What exactly did Mahama do for the Volta Region?
“Remember in the last election, he did not get the kind of votes Jerry and the others were getting; 80, 90 percent (in presidential elections),” he said.
But then something that had happened a few months earlier seems to lend support to the questions being posed by the NDC stalwart.
In November 2022, during the 60th anniversary of the Hogbetsotso Za of the Anlo people, the Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, made an appearance upon an invitation.
During his address, he courted the anger of residents present, becoming a victim of a booing incident targeted at the presidency, after he started making statements about the achievements of his party, the NPP, in the Volta Region.
As Agbotadua Kumassah, a member of the Hogbetsotso Planning Committee explained later, the people gathered at the grounds of the event started getting agitated when the vice president started talking about the economy.
He explained that the people, being well-aware that some of the things he was saying were false, started to boo at him.
“When he entered the economic situation, that is when the problem started. He mentioned, among others, that they built more airports than any other government, they built more roads than any other government and the people who were there did not see the roads, the airports, the roads he was referring to.
“So, that brought some agitation and it became very difficult to control the people because what he was saying, none of them happened in the area,” he explained.
Agbotadua Kumassah also explained that Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia’s explanations on the government’s works in the digitization field, compounded the anger of the people, leading to them booing at him.
But how true or not are the things he said about what they had been doing?
NPP’s development feats in Volta Region evident – Makafui Woanya:
Being the man at the helm of things in the region for the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Makafui Woanya, the regional chairman, has said countless times that his party has been able to perform creditably in the region albeit not so welcomed politically.
He explained in a graphic.com.gh report on January 5, 2023, that the NPP government has been able to revive and perform remarkable progress in some key infrastructural development projects in the region.
Some of these, he mentioned, are the steadily progressing Eastern Corridor Road Project, which is nearing completion; and the ongoing Southern Sector Water Systems Extensions Project.
“The University of Health and Allied Sciences, which the NDC is always quick to claim as their baby, is seeing massive infrastructural expansion,” he explained.
NPP drew its biggest strength from the Volta Region:
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has not been left out of the narratives or claims of what each party has been doing in the Volta Region.
In August 2020, the president said that the NPP considers the Volta Region as a “hallowed ground” that is symbolic of its struggle during the days of the party’s formation.
He added that history had even confirmed that the region had endorsed the NPP, and served as a place of refuge for its political fugitives during its darkest days, and for which reason the party can never discriminate against them.
“It was here in this region that people were most passionate about the political tradition. It was from here that the first people had to flee into political exile after independence, and it was in this region that many chiefs had to flee into political exile, and some died there.
“Many people forget that when J.B. Danquah, the first in the trinity of the Danquah-Dombo-Busia political tradition contested Kwame Nkrumah for the presidency, on Ghana becoming a republic in 1960, Danquah did not win in his home constituency in Akyem Abuakwa.
“But he won in two constituencies, one is right here in Anlo and the other is Ho West. If there was a little brittle tribal bone within my makeup, which there is not, I would not choose the Volta Region as a target. History would not allow me,” he said during a durbar of chiefs of the Anlo State at Anloga, during a working tour of the area.
John Mahama answers questions about what NDC has done for Volta Region:
Dr. Obed Asamoah’s questions have however not been left hanging because like a premonition, the former president, John Dramani Mahama, had touted his achievements in the Volta Region in 2021.
So, two clear years before such a question would be posed, the former president had already spelt out some of the achievements he had made in its ‘world bank.’
Among the tall list of things he said his government had achieved, were in educational infrastructure, health projects, roads, water and sanitation, among many others.
And much later, while speaking at a grand durbar to mark the climax of the Asogli Yam Festival in Ho, President John Mahama lamented the number of abandoned projects in the region, assuring the people that the next NDC government would complete them all.
“Projects started by the NDC have been abandoned and others that are to be completed in the region are being done at a slow pace. For some of the projects, this government asked contractors to stop work.
“But I make a commitment of the NDC that, God willing and thanks to your votes, in 2025, all these projects will resume,” he assured.
Volta must carry NDC as a religion – Fifi Kwetey:
Being the newly-elected General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Fifi Kwetey, who is also the former Member of Parliament for Ketu South, appears to have a strong say on whose side the Volta Region should stick with.
In a GNA report of Thursday, January 12, 2023, Fifi Kwetey said the region must cement its place as an unmovable bastion of the NDC.
Admitting that the region’s hold as the fortress of the NDC has weakened in recent times, also because indigenes have become increasingly discouraged from identifying with it, he urged them not to lose sight of the fact that the NDC is a party birthed from their backyard.
“Volta is the region where saviours of the nation come from as far as this country is concerned but we need to know who we are, and somehow, we know who we are, and we need to start appreciating who we are.
“Volta must appreciate NDC and back it no matter what. It should become like a religion. We need to let our people appreciate that this is what we are. And I believe if we knew who we were, the situation where the love for this party would start dwindling in this region should not happen,” he said.
The general elections of 2024 is less than 2 years away and although both the NDC and the NPP have each successfully elected new party executives, there are still a few major political hurdles to surmount before the big day in December 2024.
New flagbearers and the election of parliamentary candidates that will represent the parties at the constituency levels in the country will solidify the preparedness of each side of the political coin towards the general polls but it cannot be lost on anyone that with the historic breakthrough that the NPP has made into the Volta Region by winning its first ever seat in parliament, the battle lines are surely drawn.
The Volta Region will play a central role in the elections and whoever emerges the winner will have to command a lot of influence from this region.
The Individual Bond Holders Association of Ghana (IBHAG) has cautioned the government against the inclusion of its members’ investments in the government debt restructuring process without engaging with them.
IBHAG warns that any disregard of this caution will be met with the most fierce resistance yet from its members.
The association further advises all individual bondholders, irrespective of whether or not they are members of IBHAG, to resist the temptation of signing onto the voluntary exchange of their existing bonds with the new ones floated by the government, the veiled threats from the minister of Finance notwithstanding.
According to IBHAG, most of its members are pensioners, traders, teachers, public servants, and individuals who have lost their jobs due to the unfavourable policies of the government.
“Some unemployed members have been able to make some savings from their sweat and toil, and have invested from as little as GHC500 in bonds, only for the government to rob them of their hard-earned savings – both interest and principal – using such an unconscionable debt restructuring process, which targets the individual.”
The association wonders what considerations went into the earlier exemption of individual bondholders from the local debt restructuring, only to replace the pension funds with them after labour had threatened strike action.
“We cannot be made to suffer for the recklessness and greed that characterized Ghana’s excessive borrowing, which largely is the reason why we are where we are. Government appointees at the Ministry of Finance cannot make millions of dollars as transaction (borrowing) advisors and go and enjoy with their family and friends, whilst we are denied the means to purchase our medications and pay for health care. Our inclusion means we cannot pay our children’s school fees, pay for our rent, and many other critical essentials. All these hardships are being thrown at us just to protect the greed of those appointees”, a pensioner who is a member of the association said.
IBHAG maintains that the Akufo-Addo led-government continues to overspend by maintaining bloated government machinery made up of party boys and girls with outrageous pecks.
“Whilst they continue to enjoy, the individual bond holder is being robbed by the government of his or her hard-earned savings in broad daylight, whilst the pecks of the party boys and girls are protected.”
The IBHAG called on stakeholders to join the advocacy against the looting of individual investments that the government has planned.
“Meanwhile, we urge all members as well as new ones to remain calm – even as they refuse to sign onto the voluntary exchange of bonds – as IBHAG continues to seek an audience with the government on these vexed issues.”
Veteran journalist Kwesi Pratt Jnr, has raised concerns over Akufo-Addo’s comments suggesting that prayers and divine intervention are the solutions to the challenges the country is currently facing.
According to him, the president; Akufo-Addo, has no business being at the Flagstaff house if that is the case because it will be better for those who speak to God regularly to occupy Flagstaff house.
He further stated that he is shocked the comment is coming from Akufo-Addo as he has never known the president to be one who exhibits such traits.
Speaking on Good Morning Ghana, he said;
“…I have never known him like this, there is a new Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, brand new Akufo-Addo. I never for one moment thought a day will come when Akufo-Addo will say publicly that all we need to do is to pray for out problems to go away and that the solutions to national problems like debt overhands and so on is divine interventions. I’m hearing a new Akufo-Addo.”
He said if prayer is the solution, then Akufo-Addo should vacate his for well known men of God like Archbishop Duncan William, Mensah Otabil and others to take over the Flagstaff House.
”The change in him is so dramatic and so phenomenal that it makes me worry. Let’s accept this is his current position, if this is his current position what is he doing in the Flagstaff House, if the solution to the national problem is divine intervention, then he is not qualified to be there. Because, when it comes to divine intervention, I don’t think he has the gravities of archbishop Palmer, I don’t think he has the credentials of Duncan William or Mensah Otabil, he should vacate the Flagstaff House for those who are in telephone with God every day,” he said in the show.
Jerome Yankey said he used to pull all-nighters when he was in college – not studying or partying, but scrolling on TikTok until the sun came up.
“I saw me not putting the effort into my own life, rather just trying to live vicariously through what I’m seeing,” said 23-year old Yankey. He said he lost sleep, his grades suffered, and he fell out of touch with friends and himself.
In 2021, he deleted the app. The positive impact, he said, was obvious. “It’s so great to be able to be sleeping again starting at midnight,” he said. “It’s great to be able to be up early and be more productive with the sun.”
In recent months, TikTok has faced growing pressure from state and federal lawmakers over concerns about its ties to China through its parent company, ByteDance. But some lawmakers and researchers have also been scrutinizing the impact that the short-form video app may have on its youngest users.
GOP Rep. Mike Gallagher, the incoming chairman of a new House select committee on China, recently called TikTok “digital fentanyl” for allegedly having a “corrosive impact of constant social media use, particularly on young men and women here in America.” Indiana’s attorney general filed two suits against TikTok last month, including one alleging that the platform lures children onto the platform by falsely claiming it is friendly for users between 13 to 17 years old. And one study from a non-profit group claimed TikTok may surface potentially harmful content related to suicide and eating disorders to teenagers within minutes of them creating an account.
TikTok is far from the only social platform to be scrutinized by lawmakers and mental health experts for its impact on teens. Top execs from several companies, including TikTok, have been grilled in Congress on the matter. And this week, Seattle Public Schools sued social media companies like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat and YouTube alleging the platforms have been “causing a youth mental health crisis,” making it hard for the school system “to fulfill its educational mission.”
But psychologist Dr. Jean Twenge said TikTok’s algorithm in particular is “very sophisticated” and “very sticky,” which keeps teens engaged on the platform longer. TikTok has amassed more than one billion global users. Those users spent an average of an hour and a half per day on the app in last year, more than any other social media platform, according to the digital analytics platform SensorTower.
“A lot of teens describe the experience of going on TikTok and intending to spend 15 minutes and then they spend two hours and or more. That’s problematic because the more time a teen spends on social media, the more likely he or she is to be depressed. And that’s particularly true for at the extremes of use,” said Twenge.
That may only compound a longer-term rise in mental health issues, partly fueled by technology. Psychologists say as smartphones and social media grew around 2012, so did the rate of depression among teens. Between 2004 and 2019 the rate of teen depression nearly doubled, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. And for teen girls its worse. By 2019, one in four US girls have experienced clinical depression, according to Twenge.
TikTok said it has tools to help users set limits for how long they spend on the app each day. TikTok also continues to roll out other safeguards for its users, including ways to filter out mature or “potentially problematic” videos and more parental controls.
“One of our most important commitments is supporting the safety and well-being of teens, and we recognize this work is never finished. We continue to focus on robust safety protections for our community while also empowering parents with additional controls for their teen’s account through TikTok Family Pairing,” TikTok said in a statement to CNN.
The company said between April and June of 2022 it removed 93.4% of videos on self-harm and suicide from the app before they were ever viewed. But teens say it’s not the most egregious videos that keep them engaged. It’s the content programmed to them in the “For You” section of the app.
“It’s so curated to you,” said Angelica Faustino, an 18-year-old sophomore at the University at Buffalo, who says she spends 3 to 4 hours a day on TikTok.
“There is a lot of body checking on TikTok – a lot of people showing off things about themselves that are maybe unachievable. You see if enough times you are like maybe I should be that way,” said Faustino.
For all the concerns, however, there are signs that TikTok and other social networks can have a positive impact on younger users, too.
The majority of teens say social media can be a space for connection and creativity, according to Pew Research. Eight in 10 teens ages 13-17 say social media makes them feel more connected to what’s going on in their friends lives and 71% say social media is a place they can be creative, according to Pew.
And some in Gen Z, the generation that has been raised on TikTok, have found unique opportunities on the platform.
Hannah Williams spends her time on TikTok running her business, Salary Transparent Street. She interviews everyday Americans about the salary they make at their jobs, providing pay transparency to her nearly 1 million followers.
“I quit my job in May of 2022 to work on my social media page on Tik Tok full time because I saw a great opportunity to do something with my career,” said 26 year-old Williams.
“I think it’s interesting that we can try to use social media to really impact the world for good,” she said, “and I’m hoping that’s what happens.”
France on Thursday fined TikTok 5 million euros ($5.4 million) for shortcomings linked to the short video platform’s handling of online tracking known as “cookies”, which the ByteDance-owned company said it had now addressed.
French data protection watchdog CNIL said that its investigation only concerned the website tiktok.com and not the service’s much more heavily used smartphone applications.
The CNIL found that for tiktok.com’s users, it was not as easy to refuse online trackers as to accept them. The authority also found that internet users were not sufficiently informed about TikTok’s use of the cookies.
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“These findings relate to past practices that we addressed last year, including making it easier to reject non-essential cookies and providing additional information about the purposes of certain cookies,” a spokesperson for TikTok said.
“The CNIL itself highlighted our cooperation during the course of the investigation and user privacy remains a top priority for TikTok,” the spokesperson added.
Under European Union rules, websites must clearly ask for the prior consent of internet users for any use of cookies – small pieces of data stored while navigating on the Web.
They should also make it easy to refuse them, according to the EU’s rules.
($1 = 0.9253 euros)
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Reporting by Tassilo Hummel and Mathieu Rosemain; Editing by GV De Clercq and Alexander Smith.
An accident at Gomoa Antseadze near Apam in the Central Region has claimed 7 lives.
The tragic incident which occurred on Thursday, January 12, 2023, involved a Sprinter mini bus with registration number GW7920-22, which veered off into the bush while travelling from Mankessim towards Accra, graphiconline reports.
Fire service personnel reportedly arrived at the accident scene at about 8pm following a report by the [passer-by at the Apam Fire Station.
According to the Central Regional Public Relations Officer of the Ghana National Fire Service, Division Officer III, Abdul Wasiu Hudu, the station quickly dispatched the rescue team to the scene and observed a Sprinter minibus was involved in an accident with a number of the passengers trapped in the vehicle.
He said the police carried the dead to the morgue.
Meanwhile, 8 people including an infant have reportedly sustained some injuries.
Fifi Kwetey, General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) has said that the Volta Region as the portion of Ghana where heros of the country come from.
“Volta is the region, where saviours of the nation come from as far as this country is concerned but we need to know who we are, and somehow, we know, who we are, and we need to start appreciating who we are.
“Volta must appreciate NDC and back it no matter what. It should become like a religion. We need to let our people appreciate that this is what we are.
“And I believe if we knew who we were, the situation where the love for this party would start dwindling in this Region should not happen,” he said during a retreat for regional executives at Dzodze in the Ketu North Municipality.
He is concerned that unlike the Ashanti and Eastern regions which are strongholds of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP), the NDC’s fortunes in the Volta Region are dwindling.
“Because somehow, they (Ashanti and Eastern) appreciate it, and believe in their party as a religion. Your Religion may not be the best religion, yet that is your religion. It is your responsibility to make sure you fix it, and you change it.”
Kwetey also tasked the rank and file to rededicate themselves to supporting the party and do all it takes to ensure that they sell the NDC gospel as the party gears up to wrestle power after the 2024 elections.
At the opening of the four-day event which was on the theme “Empowering Our Base for Victory in 2024,” Dan Abodakpi, Chairman of the National Council of Elders tasked party executives to unite with MPs and other stakeholders particularly the grassroots to be able to remain formidable.
Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, the Majority Leader in Parliament, has emphasized the governing New Patriotic Party’s (NPP) ‘we have the men’ slogan with respect to the upcoming 2024 flagbearerhip race.
According to him, most of the aspirants who are rumoured to be interested or have openly declared their intentions have what it takes to represent the party and to ‘break the 8,’ i.e. win the 2024 elections.
In an interview with pro-NPP network Asaase Radio (January 12, 2023), the Member of Parliament for Suame said even though a number of aspirants are in the race, one name stood above all but that he wa refraining from mentioning it yet.
“I can say that many of them that I have assessed have the potential of helping us break the 8 [but] there may be a primo among them.
“In terms of competence and qualification, I can vouch for many of them who have come up, like [Vice-President Mahamudu] Bawumia, Alan Kyerematen, Owusu Afriyie Akoto, Boakye Agyarko … Kennedy Agyapong, Kwabena Agyepong, Kofi Konadu Apraku …” he said.
The comments by the MP, who also doubles as the Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, comes on the back of two cabinet-level resignations in respect of Alan Kyeremayen and Owusu Afriyie Akoto, outgoing Ministers of Trade and Industry and Agriculture respectively.
The former resigned last week and has since announced his ambition to contest the NPP flagbearership. The latter’s resignation took place earlier this week and was accepted on Thursday, January 12.
Both the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) and the NPP are expected to elect their flagbearers ahead of keenly-awaited 2024 elections.
Former president John Dramani Mahama is seen as a frontrunner to lead the NDC for a third successive bid as candidate.
In the case of the NPP, aside from Alan, Bawumia and the, former Minister of Agric, Assin Central Member of Parliament Kennedy Agyapong and former General Secretary Kwabena Agyepong are among some of the candidates expected to contest for the slot.
As part of the government’s efforts to develop an integrated automotive value industry, the Trade Ministry has inaugurated the Ghana Automotive Industry Development Council.
The Council is made up of representatives of relevant stakeholders from both the public and private sectors.
The function of the Council will be to make recommendations to the government on the implementation of the Ghana Automotive Development Programme, including but not limited to the Incentive and Regulatory Framework, Access to Industrial Infrastructure, Vehicle Financing, Training, Technology Upgrading, Supplier Development, and Standards and Safety.
The drafting of the Ghana Automotive Component Manufacturing Policy will also provide incentives and a regulatory regime to attract component manufacturers into Ghana’s Automotive Industry whilst taking advantage of the existing resource.
The Ghana Automotive Industry Development Council will among others, develop an effective economic consultation structure to effectively address any issues related to Automotive Assembly activities and to provide input into any policy review exercise.
With the operationalisation of the Council, the Ghana Automotive Development Centre has also been established to serve as an Office Complex to among others host the Secretariat of the Council and provide offices for Policy Support, Vehicle Financing, Investment and Customs Facilitation, Training and Skills Development, Vehicle Testing and Certification as well as a showroom for exhibiting locally assembled vehicles.
The Minister of Trade and Industry, Alan Kyerematen at the inauguration of the council appealed to all players in the industry to continue to work together to promote the development and competitiveness of the players in the auto industry in Ghana and position companies to take full advantage of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
Former presidential spokesman, Samuel Koku Anyidoho, has commented on the ragig debate on the controversial filming of footage from the Jubilee House by American rapper Meek Mill late last year.
Anyidoho described the episode as an embarrassment for the president and the nation at large and blamed the faux pas on officials at the presidency who should have enforced necessary protocols for visitors at the Jubilee House.
Meek Mill visited the presidency, after his performance at the Afro Nation concert in Accra, meeting with President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo at the insistence of his daughter, Gyankroma.
Barely a week after his return to the States, the rapper released a promo to an upcoming video which contained footage from areas filmed outside and within the Jubilee House.
The video attracted massive backlash on the presidency and government at large, with critics on traditional and social media questioning the moral and security implications of same.
“Someone slept on their job and has created an embarrassment for the president and the country as a whole.
“For example, from what I saw, the guy was standing behind the presidential lectern.. and the Coat of Arms, which is usually for the exclusive use of the president, is in front of it. Who gave him that opportunity?” Anyidoho asked.
GhanaWeb checks show that the lectern Mill stood behind was that of “THE PRESIDENCY – REPUBLIC OF GHANA” which is used by all guests to the presidency. The president exclusively used one with the label “PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF GHANA.”
Anyidoho further explained that from his understanding of the viral clip, the rapper must have completed his formal engagement with the president before engaging in the other acts that should not have happened.
“The president must have already met him in his visitors or conference room and this boy descends and someone overlooks and allows him to do what he did,” Anyidoho stated on Accra-based Okay FM (January 10, 2023).
The rapper issued an apology to Ghanaians and the presidency after footage of the Jubilee House was contained in a video he was set to release.
He deleted the promo he had posted on Instagram and absolved the presidency of knowing that he was taking videos during his visit to the place.
Government is under fire to explain how the highest security installation in the country suffered such a breach.
The Member of Parliament (MP) for Assin Central Kennedy Agyapong has been justifying why he deserves to lead the party in 2024.
He claims he has committed a lot of sacrifices for the party including paying off a loan of $3 million with interest that the party contracted when the party had nothing in the year 1992.
“I paid the loan with interest, and it took us eight years, Super Care Company LTD; my company took eight years to pay back the loan with interest. Three million dollars at that time plus interest in 1992. Even today as we speak, $3 million is a lot of money how much more 31 years ago.” Kennedy Agyapong said this in an interview with NET 2 TV.
According to the businessman, when the party won the elections in 2001 after a long struggle. However, Former President John Agyakum Kufuor never left him out and he is always grateful to him.
“That is why I will always give credit to President Kufuor. When he came to power, for the first four years I didn’t get any job to do, so when I went to tell him about it, he was shocked.
Kennedy Agyapong added that he purchased pickups for the NPP during elections.
“In 2004, Myself and Mr. Oppong, we bought 100 pick-ups for the party. In 2008 myself and Oppong again bought 240 TATA pick-ups for the NPP for every constituency” he claimed.
The Ghana Education Service’s decision to expel eight Chiana Senior High School students has drawn criticism from the minority in parliament (GES).
In a statement signed by ranking member on Parliament’s Education Committee, Peter Nortsu-Kotoe, the Minority described the decision as ‘harsh’ and ‘retrogressive’.
According to the Minority, even though the students who insulted President Akufo-Addo in a viral video acted out of order, their right to education should not be curtailed.
The statement said the right to education is guaranteed by the 1992 Constitution, hence the move by the GES must be reviewed.
“Whereas the Minority is against the misconduct of the eight students, and condemns same, we wish to state that the decision by the GES to dismiss them is harsh and retrogressive”, the statement emphasised.
The release from the Minority further disclosed that, “In this age and time when there is increased advocacy and renewed focus on increasing access to education, any decision that takes a child away from the classroom can only be seen as an absolute drawback to this renewed focus and objective.
It is therefore, regrettable to learn of the decision of the Ghana Education Service (GES) to dismiss the eight female students of the Chiana SHS in the Kassena Nankana West District of the Upper East region for insulting the President of the Republic some months ago”.
Having criticised the decision by the GES, the Minority went ahead to plead with the President to intervene in the matter.
“We are also by this statement, urging the GES to proffer an alternative but corrective punishment to the eight students.
This we believe would be in the best interest of our collective goal to ensuring that every Ghanaian child has access to formal education.
In conclusion, the Minority wishes to appeal to His Excellency the President, to use his good offices to pardon these students as he did in 2020 when a group of some students misconducted themselves towards him”, the statement ended.
Earlier today, the Ghana Education Service (GES) dismissed eight students of the Chiana Senior High School in the Upper East Region for allegedly insulting President Akufo-Addo.
Prior to the dismissal, the students had been on suspension.
The GES says its investigation into the incident confirmed that the students used unsavoury language against the President in a viral video.
It thus described the actions of the students as “very undesirable, and contrary to the acceptable standards of the conduct generally required of any student in Ghana’s educational system”.
Prior to the dismissal of the students, the GES had earlier apologised to the President over the said conduct.
Meanhwile, reacting to the news of the dismissal, some Ghanaians have taken to social media to berate the GES over its decision.
According to the critics, the decision is simply untenable.
One of them is an advocate for children’s rights who is unenthused about the decision.
The Country Director of the International Child Development Programme, Joyce Larnyoh said the Ghana Education Service should employ more appropriate means of punishment other than dismissal.
Speaking on JoyNews’ News Desk, Mrs Larnyoh reiterated that no child should be denied the right to education no matter the circumstance.
Others have however backed the move; arguing that it will help instill discipline amongst students, especially at the Senior High School level.
The affected students have since apologised for their actions.
Ghanaian economist, Kwame Pianim is currently trending on Twitter following his comment on Ghana’s economy.
Kwame Pianim in an interview with TV3 said government is sitting on a timebomb if it goes ahead to implement the Domestic Debt Exchange programme.
He further said that Ken Ofori-Atta’s irresponsibility and recklessness has led the country into a ditch, which has resulted in the need for the country to undertake a debt restructuring exercise for an IMF bailout.
“…I would have been proud as a Ghanaian to contribute to the debt restructuring exercise but I will not contribute one pesewa for Ken Ofori-Atta leading this, he led us into the gutter…” he stressed.
Following his comment, he has topped Twitter trends with many social media users reacting to his statement.
“AIR -Arrogance, Incompetence and Recklessness. Renowned economist Dr. Kwame Pianim. Who is he referring to?” Nelson Bonkena quizzed.
“We have men like Kwame Pianim in this country but we no dey mind them…” Mr_Kormy Tweeted
Below are some of the tweets
Kwame Pianim dropping common sense but it look like gems! NPP is so arrogantly ignorant and dvmb esp their supposed economic team and Ghanaians are so docile and stvpid allowing these to go on unstopped! And funny enough #BawumiaNeverLies is trending at 1 pic.twitter.com/uv7nnpCG2t— JESUS Is King ????✨ (@GhanaSocialU) January 12, 2023
Ken Ofori Atta is behaving like a child who killed both parents and when he was charged for murder, pleaded he should be pardoned because he is an orphan.
~Kwame Pianim
— Suadique Musah???? (@Suadiquemusa) January 12, 2023
i can sit and listen to kwame pianim for a whole day.
pure wisdom !
— Rahman™???????? (@rahmann_23) January 12, 2023
If we have people like Kwame Pianim in this country and still leaders in this country does not seek advice from him hmmmm….what an intelligent man ,God bless him and may he live long..@kwamepianim#Tv3newday #JohnniesBite— Pocket_Money (@jacobAmarquaye1) January 12, 2023
Following the resignation of two ministers, Dailyguide has reported that the Akufo-Addo-led administration may soon undergo a reorganization of its cabinet.
The Minister for Food and Agriculture, Owusu Afriyie Akoto tendered in a resignation from his role as state minister on Tuesday, following the resignation of the Minister for Trade and Industry, Alan John Kwadwo Kyerematen some few days ago.
According to Daily Guide, even though the President had on several platforms justified the inclusion of his ministerial team, the pullout of the two ministers has made it inevitable to reshuffle the team with possible merging of some ministries.
It is also expected that, Water and Sanitation will be collapsed with Sanitation joining Local Government and Water Resources going back to Works and Housing.
Per the article published by the Daily Guide, unconfirmed sources revealed that former General Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), John Boadu may make his way to join the government.
The source also revealed that, the reshuffle may affect the MP for Abetifi and former Minister of State for National Security, Bryan Acheampong, who have been tipped for the Agric and Transport Ministries as well as National Security.
Legal Practitioner, Godwin Edudzi Tameklo, has asked government to gather mettle and acknowledge the blame of the current emergency the Ghanaian economy is confronting instead of fault the worldwide emergency.
According to him, the current government’s incompetence is why the country has colossal debt despite having more revenue sources than any other government since 1957.
Speaking on TV3’s big issues, he said this government should man up and take responsibility for the failure of the economy instead of engaging in blame game.
“What is our total debt today? Do you know by their reason of incompetent management of the exchange rate, they added 98 billion Ghana cedis to our public debt? So please stop globalizing your incompetence, face the fact, man up and say that look I have been irresponsible for the debt situation and that is why we are here.”
Edudzi Tamaklo said there is much expectation from this government because of the excess revenue they have made in the last 6 years in government.
“Do you know that the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia government have gotten more revenue than all administration since 1957? In fact, by the time NDC left office, the overall financial revenue sources available to the NDC in 8 years was 248 billion Ghana cedis, as I speak to you within the space of 6 years this government, if you put loans, grants, and tax revenue together, this government has gotten in excess of 560 billion just in six years. The bible says to whom much is given much is expected. In the midst of plenty, you have run us aground, what to do is to demonstrate humility,” he said in the interview.
The Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Samuel Abu Jinapor has said the government will give the fundamental bolster for the facilitating of the 2024 International Federation of Surveyors (FIG) working week.
He gave the assurance when a delegation from the International Federation of Surveyors led by its President, Dr. Diane Dumashie called on him on Tuesday in Accra.
The working week and conference, which will take place from May 19 to 23, 2024, is expected to draw 2,500 surveyors from over 120 countries.
Abu Jinapor stated that because his Ministry recognizes land as the mother component of its activities, all organizations in the land sector are considered integral partners and that the ministry was eager to work with the Federation to address issues in the lands sector.
He noted that for the two organizations to be successful, the Ministry and the Federation must first create a framework that would serve as a guide for the partnership.
On her part, the President of FIG, Dr. Diane Dumashie shed light on the Federation and stated that they needed to work together for mutual benefit.
Also present at the brief engagement was the Deputy Minister responsible for Lands and Forestry, Benito Owusu-Bio and other officials from FGI.
The Ashanti Region and the Greater Accra Region are considered to have Ghana’s deadliest and most dangerous roadways, respectively.
This is supported by data on the amount of mishaps and fatalities in these two regions’ cities, particularly in the capital cities of Accra and Kumasi.
Data from the Road Safety Authority of Ghana shows that the two regions recorded the most accidents and fatalities for 2022 and this has been the story for years.
In 2022, Greater Accra Region, for instance, recorded the greatest number of accidents in the country with nearly 46 percent of the total number of accidents recorded in 2022. It recorded some 6658 accidents followed by the Ashanti Region which recorded 3372 accidents, representing over 23 percent of accidents in Ghana.
The Oti Region recorded the lowest number of accidents in 2022 with only 0.64 percent of the total accidents recorded in 2022. Three other regions including the North East, Savana and the Upper West contributed less than 1 percent each to the total number of accidents recorded in 2022.
In terms of death and injuries, the two regions recorded the highest in the country with Greater Accra recording 485 accident deaths (25.01 percent of total road accident deaths) and 1989 injuries while the Ashanti Region recorded 382 deaths and 1202 injuries.
But does this mean that Greater Accra and Ashanti are the regions with the deadliest roads in Ghana?
The two regions according to statista.com host more than one-third of Ghana’s population so it should not be surprising if they see more road accidents and deaths. To check the rate of accidents and casualties, cases recorded are conventionally measured per 100,000 population.
The number of accidents per 100000 people in all the regions shows that the Greater Accra and Ashanti have the highest rate of accidents in Ghana.
The Greater Accra Region recorded approximately 123 accidents per 100000 population while the Ashanti Region recorded approximately 62 accidents per 100000 people.
However, when it comes to road accident deaths, the two regions with the highest rate of accidents, do not have the highest rate of deaths.
The Eastern Region has the highest rate of accident deaths in Ghana with approximately 11 deaths per 100,000 population compared to Greater Accra which has 9 road accident deaths per 100,000 population.
The Ashanti Region, which has the second highest rate of road accidents in Ghana, has a lower death rate (7.03 deaths per 100,000 population) compared to regions like the Western North (7.44 deaths per 100,000 population) and Ahafa (8.33 deaths per 100,000 population) which have lower accident rates.
So, it can be concluded that even though the Ashanti and Greater Accra Regions have high rates of accidents, they do not necessarily have the most dangerous roads in Ghana.
Dr. Ben KD Asante, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana National Gas Company Limited, has stated that the steady supply of gas from his organization has made Dumsor, a thing of the past.
“We want to kill dumsor anywhere not just Ghana,” he stated. “Now [with] reliable and incessant supply of gas, that menace of dumsor is gone because we have reliable gas supply now coming.”
Dr Asante made this known on Wednesday, January 11 when he took his turn at the State of Agencies Report in Accra.
He said previously there would have been power outage immediately a cable from Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRDICo) falls no matter the amount of gas the country has in store.
“But the fact that now we are able to provide reliable and sustainable gas to kill that menace of Dumsor, we can all sit here and smile.”
‘Commingled gas’
The Ghana Gas CEO mentioned that aside the supply from Atuabo, there is also reliable supply from the West African Gas Pipeline from Nigeria, giving the country commingled gas to power plants in the Tema enclave, in particular.
The plants in that enclave include AKSA Energy (203MW), CENPOWER (330MW) and Sunon Asogli (560MW).
The Company also supplies lean gas to the Volta River Authority’s twin power plant (TAPCO), which generates 330 MW, TICO Plant (330MW), Karpowership (450MW) and Amandi Power Plant (192MW).
Dr Asante said his outfit’s vision is to supply gas not only across the country but also to the sub-region.
“The vision of the company is to become a fully integrated gas services firm providing reliable supply of gas and gas derivatives in Ghana and the West African Sub-region,” Dr Asante said.
Oxfam, the bloc of global organizations fighting against poverty has ranked Ghana’s engagement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 2015 as one of the most open processes globally.
In a report authored by Oxfam, the openness was grounded in how the then-government approached the fund leveraging on consultations with Civil Society Organizations (CSOs).
IMANI Africa’s Bright Simons shared an extract from the report on Twitter with the caption: “Oxfam says Ghana’s IMF engagement in 2015 was one of the most open in the world, with strong engagement by CSOs pushing a public interest agenda.”
He added that as an actor in the CSO sector, he agreed with Oxfam: “I also find that the current IMF process is the opposite: with zero govt interest in openness & engagement.”
Mahama government goes to IMF
In 2015, Ghana’s economy was in trouble, hobbled by widening current account and budget deficits, rampant inflation, and a depreciating currency. Credit dried up as interest rates rose and banks’ bad loans piled up.
At the root of Ghana’s woes was out-of-control government spending, largely to pay salaries of an overgrown civil service.
The program
In early 2015, Ghana turned to the IMF for a $918 million loan to help stabilize the economy. IMF advisors, working with the Ghanaian government, developed a three-part program:
Extract from IMF report: Box 2: Ghana
Of all the case studies, Ghana represented the most successful example of meaningful engagement between CSOs and the IMF. This success was due to several factors which collectively amplified the power of Ghanaian civil society with respect to the IMF.
These included: the formation of a joint coalition of over 11 CSOs in 2014, known as the Civil Society Platform on the IMF Programme – now the Economic Governance Platform (EGP); structured preparation and capacity building among the coalition prior to and during IMF engagement; the support of Global North actors such as Oxfam in accessing IMF decision makers and political stakeholders at headquarters level; detailed research and published analysis of the issues up for discussion;*# and public-facing awareness and advocacy campaigns which included experts and stakeholders from different sectors.
These combined factors meant the coalition’s goals and concerns could not be ignored.
The Civil Society Platform on the IMF Programme [the Platform’) was principally responsible for ensuring the success of civil society negotiations with the IMF.
National Communications Officer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Sammy Gyamfi says the country’s debt crisis is a result of government’s refusal to heed sound advice.
According to him, government officials were throwing parties and drinking Hennessey when the NDC was sounding cautions about Ghana’s increasing debt stock.
This he said, is the reason for the country’s current economic woes which have become a burden for both the state and citizens at large.
The NDC spokesperson made these remarks while bemoaning Ghana’s current debt stock and the attendant challenges on Adom TV’s Badwam programme on Monday.
Since Ghana gained independence in 1957 till date, the current debt figures by the NPP transcends all debts accrued within this period. Meanwhile, they can’t also account for any rewarding projects they’ve used the monies for.
When we were advising them, they did not listen. Rather, they were feasting on kenkey, cooking waakye and throwing kenkey and waakye parties with Hennessey at the Finance Ministry, amidst innuendoes at us
This is the end results, Sammy Gyamfi said.
He added that, the excessive borrowing by the government was because of its ‘selfishness’ and ‘greed’.
Venting his spleen, Mr Sammy Gyamfi further dismissed the defence by government communicators that the current economic crisis is due to the ravages of the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war.
The sentiments by the NDC Communications Officer adds to the barrage of criticisms from the party as well as other citizens, given the current state of the economy.
At the moment, the country’s economic situation is at an all-time low, amidst a deprecation of the local currency against other major trading currencies including the US dollar.
Inflation is also at an all-time high, with the country’s end of year inflation for 2022 hitting at 54.1%
An infograph of Ghana’s inflation rate for December 2022, gleaned from the Ghana Statistical Service
Meanwhile, Ghana has reiterated its assurance on working to make the economy better.
Speaking at thanksgiving service at the Jubilee House earlier this week, President Akufo-Addo noted that he is positive about brighter days for Ghana, despite the present state of affairs.
General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) has said the Volta Region must cement its place as an unmovable bastion for the Party.
Fifi Kwetey said the Region’s hold as the fortress for the NDC had weakened in recent times as indigenes had become increasingly discouraged from identifying with the Party, while strongholds of the main political opponent, the NPP, remained fruitful.
Mr Kwetey was opening a regional retreat for Regional Executives of the Party at Dzodze in the Ketu North Municipality of the Volta Region, which is on the theme “Empowering Our Base for Victory in 2024.”
He said the Volta Region remained the birthplace and base of the NDC and should be maintained as the Party lost its monopoly over the northern parts of the country.
“Volta is the Region, where saviours of the nation come from as far as this country is concerned but we need to know who we are, and somehow, we know, who we are, and we need to start appreciating who we are.
“Volta must appreciate NDC and back it no matter what. It should become like a religion. We need to let our people appreciate that this is what we are. And I believe if we knew who we were, the situation where the love for this party would start dwindling in this Region should not happen.
He said a careful watch of what happens in Ashanti Region, and the Eastern Region, indicates that no matter how poor the NPP may perform, they understand that their Party is the NPP, and nothing changes that.
“Because somehow, they appreciate it, and believe in their party as a religion. Your Religion may not be the best religion, yet that is your religion. It is your responsibility to make sure you fix it, and you change it.”
The General Secretary went on to say, that “we need to let our people appreciate that this is who we are. There is nothing shameful about it.
You talk to some of our young people from Volta and they think it is something of pride to say ‘yea, we are not like our forefathers and uncles, and we believe that we should not continue with that.”
He alleged that NPP had managed to discourage natives of the region from adopting the Party and was robbing the region of its political lineage.
It is our job to ensure that our children remain loyal to this foundation to make it better. The NDC should be much more than a Party for us. It should be a religion.”
Mr Kwetey called for “better coordination” to be able work towards the Party’s needs, adding that Voltarians remained the most faithful to the Party, and sustained its popularity across the Country.
He said the Region must therefore become more creative to be able to lead the Party, and that the Party should work closer with the diaspora, and ensure such communities duly benefited from power.
The four-day retreat would help strategise towards the coming general elections which the Party hopes to win, and present are some National and Regional Executives and some Members of Parliament from the Region.
Mr Dan Agbodakpi, Chairman of the National Council of Elders who chaired the opening said Party executives must work in unity with MPs and other stakeholders particularly the grassroots to be able to remain formidable.
The Convener of the Individual Bondholders’ Forum, Senyo Hosi, has described as oppressive the government’s Domestic Debt Exchange programme.
He bemoaned that, if the debt programme is allowed to go through, about 60-70% of individual bondholders’ investments may automatically be eroded.
Government in December 2022, hinted that individual bondholders who were previously exempted from the Debt Exchange programme will be included, extending the deadline for registration to January 16, 2023.
Speaking on Eyewitness News, an incensed Mr. Hosi, said, “today I see people’s livelihoods eroding away, in some instances 60%-70% of their wealth is gone. Some may not even live to benefit from the current programme. It’s a very sad situation, and I’m awakened to that responsibility. What’s going on is not right, it’s bullshit, it’s oppressive. It defeats the entire process of finance”.
The Convener of the Individual Bondholders’ Forum slammed the Akufo-Addo government for failing to create room for engagements.
“More importantly, even in governance, you have real lives you are impacting, and you are not creating real room for engagements, who does that? Government should open a channel for us to negotiate on the arrangements,” Mr. Hosi demanded.
An infuriated Convener of the group charged the individual bondholders to reject the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme until a good deal is offered them by the government.
“The way government is forcing people to come on board, we are also saying no to the Debt Exchange Programme. We are not your whipping cart. [President] Nana Akufo-Addo, you can’t forget that you are dealing with people’s lives. We are encouraging every individual bondholder to reject the Debt Exchange Programme, write to your fund managers to reject it. We are saying no to Debt Exchange Programme till they [government] sit down and give us a deal that makes sustainable sense for us as individuals,” Mr. Hosi said.
Mobile money (Momo) service providers commenced the implementation of the 1 percent Electronic Transfer Levy (E-Levy) on electronic money transfers on Wednesday, January 11, 2023.
The implementation of the new E-Levy charge comes after Parliament approved a proposal by the government to amend the rate of the levy from the initial 1.5 percent to 1 percent.
Parliament, however, did not approve the government’s proposal to remove the GHC 100 daily threshold that will attract the Electronic Transfer Levy.
So, how will the reduction in the E-levy rate impact the livelihood of Ghanaians?
If a Momo user in a day transfers GHC 150 to another Momo user, only GHC 50 can be charged the 1 percent E-Levy.
So, the person will now be charged only GHC 0.5 (GHp 50) compared to GHC 0.75 (GHp 75), s/he will be paying when the levy was 1.5 percent.
For a GHC 500 transfer, GHC 400 will be charged E-Levy which correspondence to GHC 4 compared to the GHC 6 the person will have paid when the levy was 1.5 percent.
Below is a table of E-Levy transactions and their corresponding changes plus the saving (reductions) Momo users are enjoying now:
But E-Levy is not the only tax, mobile money users are going to pay. In addition, to the levy, Momo users are also supposed to pay telecommunication (telco) charges depending on their service provider.
So, for example, using the telco charges of the largest Momo issuer in Ghana, MTN, 0.75 percent, an accumulative daily transfer of GHC 150 will attract an E-Levy of GHC 0.5 and a telco charge of GHC 1.125, making the total tax on the transfer GHC 1.625.
Below is a list of the total charges Momo users will be paying with the new 1 percent E-Levy:
Some residents staying along the Adukrom-Aseseeso road in the Okere Distirct of the Eastern Region have expressed concern that they were exposed to health hazards following the generation of dust as a result of rehabilitation works being undertaken on the road.
Parts of the Adukrom-Mampong road have been entirely scrapped for the spreading of new asphalt even though residents and drivers say the road was in near perfect shape but for a “few” potholes.
Three months on, works are yet to start on the project, leaving the residents to their fate.
Works on the Aseseeso stretch which is part of ongoing works on the Koforidua-Adukrom-Somanya road is also exposing the residents to endless dust.
Though the roads are supposed to be watered regularly to assuage the plight of the people, the residents say this is no longer done.
The nature of the dusty road now is making life unbearable for residents with the public and road users becoming at risk of respiratory diseases.
The residents say shop owners were being compelled to close down their shops because selling by the roadside has become risky to both sellers and buyers.
A few who brace through the heavily- polluted environment are aware of the consequences but explain they have run out of options.
A common scene to behold is dusty buildings, vehicles and even crops as many people resort to the use of nose masks to prevent inhaling the dust.
A barber who gave his name as Bongo has his shop located by the dusty Adukrom-Akropong road. Complaining about the problem, in an interview with GhanaWeb, he said, “it’s a big problem for those of us by the roadside. We suffer from catarrh and we can’t stand it. We’re appealing to the authorities to come and address this problem for us.”
He added that though the contractor used to water the road, this has ceased without any explanation.
54-year-old Madam Abena runs a table top sewing business at Aseseeso. Wearing a nose mask to protect herself from the dust, she fears she might nevertheless soon develop a dust-induced infection if nothing was done about the situation.
Motorists, especially commercial drivers who ply the route have their share in the danger. One of them, a taxi driver who plies the Adukrom-Mampong road, Seth Opare told GhanaWeb that the situation compels drivers to send their vehicles for servicing and washing on regular basis at high cost as a result of the bumpy and dusty nature of the road.
Assembly man for Methodist Electoral Area, Hon Ebenezer Obiri Asare says he raised the motion on the issue in the last Assembly sitting and though assurances were given to water the roads regularly, nothing has been done.
Describing the state of the problem, the Assemblyman said, “because we are in the harmattan season, we don’t have torrential rain and this has caused us more dust leaving most of the residents at risk of cold and businesses are affected.”
The affected are thus calling on the government to prevail on the Ghana Highway Authority (GHA), to ensure that the contractors working on the roads executed the projects such that it did not affect their health.
They are also calling on the contractors to water the road daily to reduce the volume of dust on the roads.
Fox News contributor Raymond Arroyo weighs in on Prince Harry’s media appearances, Hakeem Jeffries’ acceptance speech and Louisiana requiring user identification on adult sites on ‘The Ingraham Angle.’
Kate Middleton was spotted for the first time since Prince Harry’s explosive memoir “Spare” hit bookshelves.
On Wednesday, the Princess of Wales attempted to keep a poker face as she was snapped by photographers while driving to Windsor Castle. The wife of Prince William was among the several members of the British royal family who found themselves at the center of controversy after the book went on sale around the world on Tuesday.
In the ghostwritten memoir, the Duke of Sussex detailed his grief following the death of his mother, Princess Diana, as well as his strained relationship with the Prince of Wales. He also expressed his frustration at the role of royal “spare” in the shadow of his older brother William, who is heir to the British throne.
Catherine, Princess Of Wales, seen here for the first time since the release of “Spare” as she returns to Windsor Castle. (TheImageDirect.com)
Harry slammed the U.K.’s tabloid press for coverage he considered prurient, intrusive and sometimes plain wrong. The 38-year-old claimed his relatives were unwelcoming to his wife Meghan Markle and even accused members of the royal family, including his stepmother Camilla, of leaking stories to the media to burnish their own reputations.
PRINCE HARRY SLAMS BRITISH PRESS, ‘SALACIOUS HEADLINES’ ON ‘THE LATE SHOW,’ CLAIMS HIS WORDS HAVE BEEN SPUN
So far, it has been business as usual for the royals. Harry’s aunt, Princess Anne, carried on with her duties on Wednesday by visiting British soldiers serving with a United Nations peacekeeping force in ethnically divided Cyprus.
Queen Elizabeth II’s only daughter met with Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades. They discussed climate change-related issues, the energy crisis spurred by Russia’s war in Ukraine, and efforts to restart stalled talks to reunify Cyprus, a government statement said.
Britain’s Princess Anne leaves the presidential palace after a meeting with President Nicos Anastasiades, in Nicosia. Cyprus on Wednesday, Jan. 11, 2023. (Photo by Danil Shamkin/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Media access during her visit was limited. The 72-year-old did not make any public remarks.
Buckingham Palace officials have declined to comment on any of the allegations made in Harry’s book. A spokesperson for King Charles III didn’t immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment. A spokesperson for Kensington Palace, which represents the Prince and Princess of Wales, told Fox News Digital they don’t have a comment. Allies of the royal family have pushed back on Harry’s claims, largely anonymously.
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Harry’s exposure of bitter divides inside the House of Windsor – alongside details of his mental health struggles, experiences with sex and drugs and decade-long military career – has generated reams of media coverage. The father of two has embarked on a press tour to promote the book, making appearances on ITV, CBS’ “60 Minutes,” “Good Morning America,” and most recently, “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.” He is also on the cover of People magazine.
Prince Harry is seen leaving “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” on Jan. 9, 2023, in New York City. (Gotham/GC Images)
In the book, Harry recounted the infamous fallout between Middleton and Markle, both 41, which allegedly left the former American actress “sobbing on the floor.” The tense exchange allegedly took place days before the Duke and Duchess of Sussex tied the knot in 2018. In an excerpt, Harry claimed that his sister-in-law made the former “Suits” star cry after she demanded that “all the dresses” for the flower girls be remade.
“Charlotte’s dress is too big, too long, too baggy,” Middleton allegedly texted Markle, as quoted by Harper’s Bazaar. She was referring to her daughter’s flower girl dress. According to Harry, the dresses were made from measurements obtained at a previous fitting.
“She cried when she tried it on at home,” Middleton allegedly texted.
KATE MIDDLETON’S BIRTHDAY GETS OVERSHADOWED BY PRINCE HARRY’S ‘SPARE’ AS ROYALS MAINTAIN WALL OF SILENCE
Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge leaves with her daughter Princess Charlotte after attending the wedding ceremony of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, on May 19, 2018. (Andrew Matthews/AFP via Getty Images)
According to Harry, Markle reminded Middleton that a tailor who could perform alterations was already at Kensington Palace.
“Right, and I told you the tailor has been standing by since 8am,” Markle allegedly replied. “Here. At KP. Can you take Charlotte to have it altered, as the other mums are doing?”
The book alleged that Middleton demanded that “all the dresses be remade,” noting that her own wedding dress designer agreed with her. Markle then reminded Middleton that she was stressed following the drama involving her father Thomas Markle. The former Hollywood lighting director famously didn’t attend the royal wedding.
The alleged royal row between the Princess of Wales and the Duchess of Sussex has been well-documented by the British press. (Richard Pohle – WPA Pool/Getty Images)
“Kate said she was well aware, but the dresses. And the wedding is in four days!” claimed the book. It also alleged that Middleton had “problems with the way Meg was planning her wedding… it went back and forth.” Harry wrote that when he came home, his wife-to-be was “sobbing.”
PRINCE HARRY’S TOP 5 ’60 MINUTES’ BOMBSHELLS
British outlets reported that it was Markle who made Middleton cry. In “Spare,” Harry suggested that his father’s press office likely leaked the story to tabloids. The Duchess of Sussex spoke about the incident during a 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey.
“I don’t think it’s fair to her to get into the details of [the fight], because she apologized,” said Markle at the time. “And I’ve forgiven her. What was hard to get over was being blamed for something that not only I didn’t do, but that happened to me. And the people who were part of our wedding going to our comms team and saying, ‘I know this didn’t happen.’”
The alleged incident wasn’t the only moment Middleton’s name was brought up in “Spare.” In 2005, Harry notoriously wore a Nazi uniform to a costume party. He claimed in the book that it was William and Middleton who encouraged the choice of outfit and “howled” with laughter when they saw it.
Meghan Markle was interviewed by Oprah Winfrey in 2021. The televised sit-down was viewed by nearly 50 million people globally. (AP)
The book’s publisher said “Spare” sold 400,000 copies in the U.K. in all formats – hardback, e-book and audio – on its first day. It is the top-selling book on Amazon’s U.K. site and Amazon.com in the U.S. and is already one of the year’s biggest sellers.
PRINCE HARRY FEARS ‘TABLOID MEDIA’ WILL RADICALIZE ITS READERS INTO CAUSING ‘HARM’ TO HIS WIFE AND CHILDREN
“As far as we know, the only books to have sold more in their first day are those starring the other Harry (Potter),” said Larry Finlay, managing director of Transworld Penguin Random House. The final Potter book, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” sold more than 2.5 million copies on its first day of release, in 2007.
A few stores in Britain opened at midnight to sell copies to diehard royal devotees and the merely curious. Many said they wanted to form their own opinion of the book after days of snippets and debate on news sites and television.
Prince Harry’s “Spare” hit bookstores on Tuesday. (Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)
“Spare” is the latest in a string of public pronouncements by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex since they quit royal life in 2020. At the time, they cited what they saw as the media’s racist treatment of the duchess and a lack of support from the palace.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex reside in Montecito, California, with their two children.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Stephanie Nolasco covers entertainment at Foxnews.com.
Businessmen and economist, Dr Kofi Amoah, has urged persons and institutions who have been affected by the government’s debt exchange programme to fight the injustice and raw deal that has been handed them.
According to Dr Amoah, it is unconscionable that one of the supposed safest investments – government instruments- can go so horribly wrong that a debt exchange programme has to be instituted.
In a tweet shared on his personal and verified page this week, Dr Amoah said the consequence of the exchange programme is far-reaching and damning. “Ghanaians must not sit and accept financial injustice from their govt. Everywhere in the world, investing in govt financial instruments is considered the safest investment with the assured payback of investors’ funds.”
Explaining further when contacted by GhanaWeb, the former president of the GFA Normalization Committee said there is a danger of eroding the savings culture of many Ghanaians due to this debt exchange programme.
“Ghana cannot become an outlier in this globally recognized comfort zone unless we want to be counted among the failed and misgoverned countries of the world. There are far-reaching negative consequences for such behaviour.
Govt must choose paying its debt to haemorrhaging individual bondholders over spending billions on some ill-conceived, unsustainable projects calculated to win some legacy points for politicians and their political parties.”
He urged right-thinking Ghanaians to join those affected by this policy to fight against this policy which he says would be detrimental to many people and households. “When they come for me in the day and you say nothing because it’s not you, they may come for you in the thick of night and no one can see or come to your aid”.
The Habit of Robbing Individuals’ Hard-earned Money to Finance Over-bloated, corruption-laden projects Must be Halted
Support Lawyer Kpebu in assisting people get their money taken with force by govt
Govt debts are supposed to be the safest everywhere???????? https://t.co/VLh1JMm9fS
— CitizenKofi (@amoah_citizen) January 10, 2023
Debt Exchange
On December 5, 2022, the Government of Ghana launched Ghana’s Domestic Debt Exchange programme, an invitation for the voluntary exchange of approximately GHS137 billion of the domestic notes and bonds of the Republic, including E.S.L.A. and Daakye bonds, for a package of New Bonds to be issued by the Republic.
In a statement released after the announcement of the debt exchange, the finance minister, Ken Ofori Atta explained why the policy has become imperative.
“The objective is to reduce the excessive burden created by our debt on our economy and reach the debt sustainability targets defined by the IMF staff for the period through 2028 and beyond. In particular, to restore debt sustainability, we plan to reduce our total public debt-to-GDP ratio to 55% in present value terms.”
The head of the Huahi Royal Family of Boadi in the Ashanti Region has filed a suit against the Inspector General of Police (IGP) over his unlawful arrest by officers of the Ghana Police Service.
According to him, before his release, he was humiliated, subjected to torture and embarrassed at a palace instead of being processed for court.
“In my case, following my arrest on 18th November, 2021, the police failed, neglected or refused to caution or charge me for any offence but rather subjected me to torture, physical assault and humiliation on my personality and dignity.
“That I am advised by counsel and I respectfully concur with the advice that the police has no right, power or authority to arrest, restrict or detain a suspect without officially cautioning or charging him, and that any such arrest, restriction or detention contrary to the rules and procedures enshrined in the Constitution amounts to flagrant disregard for the Constitution and a breach of the constitutionally guaranteed rights of the suspect,” the plaintiff stated in his application.
It is the case of the plaintiff that by this act, the police officers violated his right to personal liberty, human dignity, right against unlawful arrest, detention or restriction and torture, as well as right to administrative fairness.
The plaintiff added that despite a petition to the Police Service to interrogate the matter, no concrete solutions had been reached, hence the suit.
Reliefs
Badu is asking the court to declare as unconstitutional his arrest, adding that the police violated his fundamental human rights guaranteed under the 1992 Constitution. As part of his reliefs, he asks for the following:
“An order directed at the respondents to pay me an amount of GH¢500,000 as compensation for my unlawful arrest and restriction pursuant to Article 14(5) of the 1992 Constitution.”
“An order directed at the respondents to compensate the applicant for the inconvenience, embarrassment, waste of time and violation of his fundamental human rights to dignity and administrative justice to a tune of GHC500,000.”
He is also asking for an order perpetually restraining the respondents, particularly all police officers involved in the misconduct under the authority of the respondent, from unlawfully arresting, restricting and/or detaining him ever again.
A cross section of Ghanaians has expressed frustration with the service of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) following the change of its meter app.
Some of the customers took to Facebook to register their displeasure after a customer shared a similar experience of not being credited after purchasing power with the new app.
Daniel Amoateng posted on Facebook saying, “ECG ECG ECG why? Please what is the name of the ECG boss I want to tag him.”
“It’s been 4 days since you debited my momo account, but my meter has not been credited, no token sent so I uploaded myself and you still haven’t credited my momo account after several complaints.”
He added: “My money is sitting with you and I have look for another money to purchase power why? In this 21st century and with the many IT people around we shouldn’t be suffering like this. I am even tired calling ur call center.”
ECG officials are yet to comment on the situation.
Below is the full post:
Meanwhile, some frustrated customers have also been sharing their experience on the development:
“Same happened to me last weekMy money is still with them Have to buy another power from their vendors the most painful part of it was that my light came the next day When you call the cal/help centre they will just take your info/details and nothing happen, said Richmond Afransah Mends-Haizel
“Boss mine has been there for about a month ooo..if u call the tell u nonfa nkoaaa …hmmmm,” Fifi Folson said.
“Bro, for more than 4 months. My account has not been credited and a staff at the district office tells me “sika no ashi”,” Isaac Osei Appah also posted.
Pollster and political analyst, Ben Ephson has slammed New Patriotic Party(NPP) Flagbearer hopeful, Alan Kyerematen over his comment that some policy decisions of President Akufo-Addo were wrong.
The immediate-past Trade and Industry Minister in his address to officially declare his intention to contest the flagbearership race of the governing NPP, commended the President for laying a good foundation for the country’s development.
He, however, stated that he disagreed with some of the policy decisions of the President.
The former Ghana’s Ambassador to the US said a future Alan Kyerematen led-government will mainstream the private sector as the engine of his transformation agenda and also run a lean government if given the nod.
“The President has laid a strong foundation for the socio-economic development of our country, although I believe there are things that could have been done differently. My vision is to build a superstructure on this foundation that will bring prosperity to our nation.”
But speaking to Naa Dedei Tettey on Morning Starr on Starr 103.5FM Wednesday, Pollster Ben Ehpson questioned why Alan Kyerematen did not resign as Trade and Industry Minister over these disagreements with the President as a matter of principle.
“If you are a minister and the President is exiting and you want to campaign and in your speech you say that certain things that were done could have been done better, maybe in the coming days he’ll want to go further. But I thought that it was a bit unnecessary, maybe he has his own campaign strategy and so that is the only part that I was a bit surprised about.”
“You are not going to run a campaign on you, Alan Kyeremateng. You are going to campaign on the record of the NPP government for the past six to seven years. I’m sure people are going to ask him to give examples of what has not been done right. If he disagreed vehemently with what had not been done right what prevented him from resigning? If you thought it was so bad that in your first address announcing your desire to contest you are taking the President on, you have not been sentenced by any court to be a minister, he could have just said because of a few things, Mr President I can’t take up your job.”
John Alan Kwadwo Kyerematen announced his intention to run for the position of New Patriotic Party flagbearer on January 10, 2022, six days after announcing his resignation as minister of trade and industry.
In a national broadcast shared across various media platforms, the multiple-times NPP flagbearer contestant also outlined some of his ideals while appealing to delegates of the party to elect him as their choice when the time comes.
Despite lauding the government of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for laying a strong foundation on which he intends to build his future government, Mr Kyerematen also made certain pronouncements that appear as subtle attacks directed at the government in which he served.
I believe there are things that could have been done differently
While highlighting his relationship with President Akufo-Addo and praising his government, Mr Kyerematen was quick to point out in his speech that certain things under the current administration could have been done using different approaches.
“The President has laid a strong foundation for the socioeconomic development of our country, although I believe there are things that could have been done differently. My vision is to build a superstructure on this foundation that will bring prosperity to our nation,” he stated.
We promised never to go back but we have gone back to IMF
For the government of President Akufo-Addo, one of the things that has brought heavy criticism upon the president and his “men” is the decision to seek financial support from the International Monetary Fund.
Despite kicking against calls to seek a bailout from the Fund amidst severe economic challenges, the government in a dramatic turn of events is currently seeking a $3 billion loan facility from the IMF.
According to Mr Kyerematen, although government made earlier promises to refrain from going to the IMF for help, they ultimately resorted to that because of challenges somewhat beyond their control.
“This is the seventeenth time that we have gone to the IMF over the last 57 years. We promised never to go back but we have gone back.One of the lessons that we have learnt from the recent developments is that Ghana’s economy is still fragile, vulnerable and susceptible to both external and domestic shocks.
Words without actions
Mr Kyerematen while seeking to highlight his campaign policy dubbed Great Transformational Plan (GTP), outlined what he said are seven critical issues that needs consideration.
According to the flagbearer hopeful, it has become imperative for the country to be action-oriented towards achieving results instead of engaging in talks.
Describing Ghana’s current state as “No Action Talk Only (NATO)” the former minister emphasised the need for the trend to be reversed.
“Ghana is gradually becoming a NATO country – “No Action Talk Only”. We need to remember that the use of time is a zero-sum game. What Ghana needs now are solutions and actions not debates,” he noted.
Cutting the size of government
Before the onset of Ghana’s current economic challenges, President Akufo-Addo was cited by his critics as leading an overly sized government causing strain on public resources.
The recent economic challenges of the country have deepened the accusation against the government and the need for the president to cut down on his numbers.
Without explicitly agreeing with the critics of his former appointing authority, Mr Kyerematen in his address noted the need for the size of the government to be trimmed while promising to do so if he wins power.
“The architecture of Government will be overhauled by consolidating some existing Ministries, Departments and Agencies. This will mean running a lean Government structure that will ensure operational efficiency and effectiveness in the delivery of Government services,” he stated.
A diplomatically neutral state
President Akufo-Addo was recently called out by some critics for alleging that the Russian paid mercenaries were operating a mine along Burkina Faso’s border with Ghana.
The president who noted the situation as a concern to the US Secretary of State during a US-Africa Leaders Summit said the government of Burkina Faso had given out the mine to the Wagner Group as payment for work done.
Prior to the statement by the president which was deemed by many as potential grounds for a diplomatic row with Russia, the government had also been criticised for condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Speaking in his national address on Tuesday, Mr Kyerematen noted that a government of Ghana under his leadership will be neutral on matters of the international community.
“Ghana’s diplomatic and economic relations with the International Community under the GTP will be predicated on the principle of ‘positive neutrality’, based on the strategic interests of Ghana, as well as our shared commitments for the preservation of peace around the world and respect for humanity,” he stated.
A broken economy?
Before concluding his address, the flagbearer hopeful signed off with a number of proverbs to inspire hope and belief in his course.
“Akyea na emmui” he alluded to a popular Akan saying which translates to “It is bent but not broken.”
For those concerned about the current state of Ghana’s economy fraught with high cost of living and hardship, this was a way by the flagbearer hopeful to elicit hope amidst the challenges.
According to Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto, a former minister of food and agriculture, the agricultural sector of the Ghanaian economy grew significantly while he was in office.
He thanked the government, partners, stakeholders and the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) for the support in growing of the sector.
In a short statement after his resignation, he said “It’s been a great honour and privilege to serve the Ministry in the last 5 years. I express my sincere gratitude to President Akufo-Addo for the confidence reposed in me to lead agric industry.
“I thank NPP for contributing to the sector’s growth. I appreciate Ghanaian for their support.
It’s been a great honour and privilege to serve @mofaghana1 in the last 5 years. I express my sincere gratitude to @NAkufoAddo for the confidence reposed in me to lead #agric industry. I thank #npp for contributing to the sector’s growth. I appreciate 🇬🇭 for their support. pic.twitter.com/bSr5S3bNqw
— Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto (@afriyie_akoto) January 11, 2023
He resigned from the government on Tuesday January 10.
He submitted submitted his resignation letter to President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo after a meeting at the Jubilee House on Tuesday, January 10.
The former lawmaker for Kwadaso is among some big wigs of the governing who are said to have been harbouring ambitions to take over from President Akufo-Addo as the party’s Presidential Candidate for the next elections in 2024.
The Conference of Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools (CHASS) says most Senior High Schools across the country are yet to receive any food items or funds from either the Ghana Education Service or the National Food Buffer Stock Company.
The Conference which consists largely of headteachers across the country says the perennial disbursement challenges are putting a strain on their reopening activities as it is difficult to take in students with no food items to feed them.
President of the Conference who is also the headmaster of Opoku Ware School, Rev. Fr. Stephen Owusu Sekyere said they are expecting government to release their allocated funds to ensure that the reopening date is not postponed due to food shortages.
Father Owusu Sekyere told Citi News that the government defaulted on its promise to release the funds into their respective bank accounts by 9 am on January 10.
“We were promised that we should go to the bank in the morning at 9 am and that the money will be deposited into our accounts but as we speak, we keep checking our accounts and no school has received any money from their bank.”
The CHASS president said the government is also yet to supply the various schools with their food quotas in anticipation of the new academic year.
“I am having reports from some schools across the country that they are yet to receive food items. We’ve been in touch with Buffer Stock, and they say they are supplying the schools with some four food items, but my information tells me otherwise.”
The president stressed that all hopes have diminished and all they can do at the moment is to hope that the government heeds to their concerns.
“Students keep reporting, and we don’t know what to do at this point so all we can do at the moment is keep waiting for the monies to be released. We don’t have power over what happens or when the food items are supplied.”
The Judicial Committee of the Northern Regional House of chiefs has unanimously declared the enskinment of Mahama Sumani as the chief of Karaga null and void.
The Committee stated that Sumani’s enskinment goes contrary to the norms and cultural practices of the people of Dagbon.
The Committee has also given the former Regent, Mahama Sumani a 48-hour ultimatum to vacate the Karaga palace to make way for the legitimate chief enskinned by Ya Na Abukari II.
Two years ago, the overlord of Dagbon, Ya Na Abukari II, enskinned Na Nantomag Abdulai as Kari Na, however, his enskinment was opposed by some groups in the Karaga traditional area who were not pleased with the overlord’s decision.
They further went ahead to enskin the regent as the chief against the authority of the overlord.
In order to ensure a peaceful resolution, the enskinned chief by the Ya Na petitioned the Judicial Committee of the Northern Regional House of Chiefs.
In a ruling given on Tuesday, January 10 at the Regional House of Chiefs, the Committee unanimously ruled that the petitioner, Na Nantomag Abdulai was duly nominated and enskinned in accordance with Dagbon custom and tradition.
In the midst of the current economic crisis, Mr. Kwabena Agyei Agyepong , a flagbearer candidate for the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has reinforced calls on the Government to cut the number of ministers in order to give a good message to the populace.
He denounced the appointments of multiple deputy ministers, saying each minister should not have more than one deputy to reduce the cost of running the Government and enhance efficiency.
Speaking on a news programme monitored by the Ghana News Agency, Mr. Agyepong said the framers of the 1992 Constitution did not envisage larger Governments, hence their decision to peg the number of cabinet ministers at 19.
“I have never believed in having multiple deputy ministers. I think the President has one Vice President, so every minister should have one deputy.
“Small, lean, mean Government means that you are going to be efficient, more effective and the President will have a handle of his Government. It is important that we do these things, especially in financial distress,” he said.
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, at the beginning of his second term in office in 2017, trimmed down the number of ministries in his second administration from 36 to 29 and scrapped 41 ministerial positions.
The President had appointed 126 ministers in his first term.
With Ghana’s economy taking a nosedive, there have been persistent calls on the President to further downsize his Government to reduce costs.
Mr. Agyepong said the scrapping of more ministerial positions would send a positive signal to the people about the Government’s readiness to sacrifice.
“The quantum may not be enough, but it sends a moral message and signal to the rest of the people,” he said.
Mr. Agyepong said the political class must demonstrate sacrifice and selflessness to win the trust of the people and rally them to develop the country.
“It is all about service, sacrifice, and selflessness. If you don’t have these character traits, you don’t have any business going into politics,” he said.
Mr. Agyepong said governance and development issues that had bedevilled the country could not be blamed on the Constitution but on bad leadership.
He bemoaned what he described as the lack of patriotism and readiness to serve among the political class and the people at large, saying: “We need the kind of leaders that are prepared to take difficult decisions and so that all of us will be doing what is right; putting our country first before everything.”
Why so much ado about an interview given in 1995, by a person who died less than two years later?
For starters, it was no ordinary interview. Whenever Princess Diana spoke, the world took notice—and her sit-down with journalist Martin Bashir that aired on the BBC’s Panorama 25 years ago was packed with candid, eye-opening turns of phrase from Prince Charles’ estranged wife, and has continued to be described as sensational. Now, the same can be said of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s tell-all. During their two-hour interview with Oprah Winfrey, the couple held nothing back while recalling the conversations—and concerns—the royal family had about their son’s skin color, the “falsehoods” The Firm continued to perpetuate and why they really stepped away from their titles.
And today, while the world scrutinizes every word Meghan and Harry said, there’s still talk about Diana’s segment, which approximately 23 million people tuned in to watch on Nov. 20, 1995. In fact, the interview is now under renewed scrutiny with regard to how Bashir got the Princess of Wales to go on camera in the first place.
“The independent investigation is a step in the right direction,” Prince William—who historically has had no great love for the media due to their treatment of his mother and, down the road, his future wife, Kate Middleton—said in a statement released by Kensington Palace Nov. 18. “It should help establish the truth behind the actions that led to the Panorama interview and subsequent decisions taken by those in the BBC at the time.”
Pool Photograph/Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images
The investigation in question is in response to allegations from the late princess’ brother, Earl Charles Spencer, that Bashir used forged bank statements purporting to show that a former member of his security team had received money for sharing information about Diana. Moreover, it’s alleged that Bashir lied to Spencer about the queen and other senior royals in order to gain his trust and hasten a meeting. (Bashir has not yet personally responded to any of these allegations.)
People close to Diana, meanwhile, have said that she promptly regretted the whole thing—even before it had aired.
“I think the scales fell from her eyes and suddenly what had been rather a subversive or daring scheme—or however they [the BBC] had dressed it up for her—it suddenly in the cold light of day didn’t look like such a good idea,” Patrick Jephson, her former private secretary, told the Daily Mail in 2016 in response to a Mail on Sunday report that the BBC’s head of news at the time had purposely tried to keep Buckingham Palace in the dark about the Diana interview.
Express Newspapers Via AP Images
Not long after the broadcast, Queen Elizabeth II insisted that Charles and Diana, who had been separated since 1992, start divorce proceedings. Their split was finalized in 1996.
This hadn’t been the first time that Diana’s candor had made it into the public sphere, Andrew Morton’s biography utilizing recordings the princess made for him having been published in 1992. But something—maybe everything—about it rubbed the royals the wrong way. Here are the revelations that made it such an unforgettable hour:
PA Images via Getty Images
Lights, Cameras… Angst
“The most daunting aspect was the media attention,” Princess Diana told Martin Bashir on the BBC’s Panorama, “because my husband and I, we were told when we got engaged that the media would go quietly, and it didn’t; and then when we were married they said it would go quietly and it didn’t; and then it started to focus very much on me, and I seemed to be on the front of a newspaper every single day, which is an isolating experience, and the higher the media put you, place you, is the bigger the drop. And I was very aware of that.”
From the moment the press first got an inkling of a new romance between the very eligible Prince Charles and 19-year-old Lady Diana Spencer in 1980, they rarely gave her a moment’s piece, trailing her everywhere and hanging around outside her London flat. One intrepid so-called reporter even squeezed through a window at the nursery school where Diana was an aide, searching for a scoop.
She always assumed people would be more interested in her husband and his good works, “but I, during the years, you see yourself as a good product that sits on a shelf and sells well, and people make a lot of money out of you.”
JOHN SHELLEY/REX/Shutterstock
In the Deep End Down Under
Their 1983 tour of Australia and New Zealand that was widely praised as such a success was actually agony at times, Diana said.
“We went to Alice Springs, to Australia, and we went and did a walkabout, and I said to my husband: ‘What do I do now?’” she recalled. “And he said, ‘Go over to the other side and speak to [the press].’ I said, ‘I can’t, I just can’t.’ He said, ‘Well, you’ve got to do it.’ And he went off and did his bit, and I went off and did my bit. It practically finished me off there and then, and I suddenly realized—I went back to our hotel room and realized the impact that, you know, I had to sort myself out.”
After the trip, “I was a different person. I realized the sense of duty, the level of intensity of interest, and the demanding role I now found myself in.”
JSH TOUR/REX/Shutterstock
A Jealous Husband
Charles, the future King, didn’t exactly love playing second fiddle to his charming (if shy underneath it all) wife.
Asked if she was flattered by all the attention, she toldBashir, “No, not particularly, because with the media attention came a lot of jealousy. A great deal of complicated situations arose because of that.”
Eventually, Charles decided that they should do fewer joint engagements, so that on his own he would at least get some attention.
Tim Graham/Getty Images
The Real World
Diana became known as the People’s Princess for a reason. Not knowing at first what areas of public service she should get involved in when she first married Charles, patronages and advocating for causes being a large part of the job when you join The Firm, Diana explained, “I found myself being more and more involved with people who were rejected by society—with, I’d say, drug addicts, alcoholism, battered this, battered that—and I found an affinity there.”
“And I respected very much the honesty I found on that level with people I met, because in hospices, for instance, when people are dying they’re much more open and more vulnerable, and much more real than other people. And I appreciated that.”
No one from the palace ever steered her otherwise, she added, and “I’m lucky enough in the fact that I have found my role, and I’m very conscious of it, and I love being with people.”
Jayne Fincher/courtesy of HBO
Heir and a Spare
Diana openly acknowledged that her firstborn child being a boy was considered an extra-good thing by royal standards. And though she had previously said that, after Prince William was born, Charles was hoping for a daughter and was a wee bit disappointed when red-headed Prince Harry popped out instead, two boys was certainly better than two girls.
“It would have been a little tricky if it had been two girls—but that in itself brings the responsibilities of bringing them up, William’s future being as it is, and Harry like a form of a back-up in that aspect,” she said.
Anwar Hussein/Getty Images
They Called Her Crazy
Diana revealed that she experienced postnatal depression after William’s birth, “which no one ever discusses.” She said, “That in itself was a bit of a difficult time. You’d wake up in the morning feeling you didn’t want to get out of bed, you felt misunderstood, and just very, very low in yourself.”
Asked if she got help, the princess said, “I received a great deal of treatment, but I knew in myself that actually what I needed was space and time to adapt to all the different roles that had come my way. I knew I could do it, but I needed people to be patient and give me the space to do it.”
According to Diana, however, her in-laws didn’t know what to make of her.
“Well maybe I was the first person ever to be in this family who ever had a depression or was ever openly tearful,” she said. “And obviously that was daunting, because if you’ve never seen it before how do you support it?” Ultimately, “it gave everybody a wonderful new label: Diana’s unstable and Diana’s mentally unbalanced. And unfortunately that seems to have stuck on and off over the years.”
Photo by Jayne Fincher/Princess Diana Archive/Getty Images
A History of Self-Harm
Reports that Diana had harmed herself turned out to be true.
“For instance you have so much pain inside yourself that you try and hurt yourself on the outside because you want help, but it’s the wrong help you’re asking for,” she reflected. “People see it as crying wolf or attention-seeking, and they think because you’re in the media all the time you’ve got enough attention. But I was actually crying out because I wanted to get better in order to go forward and continue my duty and my role as wife, mother, Princess of Wales.
“So yes, I did inflict upon myself. I didn’t like myself, I was ashamed because I couldn’t cope with the pressures.”
She would “just” hurt her arms and legs. Asked if Charles understood why she was doing that, she said, “No, but then not many people would have taken the time to see that.”
Tim Graham Photo Library via Getty Images; Netflix
Detailing Her Eating Disorder
Diana confirmed that she also battled bulimia for years.
“You inflict it upon yourself because your self-esteem is at a low ebb, and you don’t think you’re worthy or valuable,” she said, comparing binge eating to “having a pair of arms around you, but it’s…temporary. Then you’re disgusted at the bloatedness of your stomach, and then you bring it all up again.”
After spending her days comforting others, she’d go home and comfort herself with food. But, she added, “It was a symptom of what was going on in my marriage. I was crying out for help, but giving the wrong signals, and people were using my bulimia as a coat on a hanger: They decided that was the problem—Diana was unstable.”
Kent Gavin/Mirrorpix/Getty Images
She’s No Dummy
Diana was aware that the general impression of her was that she wasn’t as intellectually deep as Charles, and she resented it.
“I made the grave mistake once of saying to a child I was thick as a plank, in order to ease the child’s nervousness, which it did,” she recalled. “But that headline went all round the world, and I rather regret saying it.”
She and Charles actually had many common interests, Diana said. “We both liked people, both liked country life, both loved children, work in the cancer field, work in hospices.”
As far as her own interests, “I don’t think I was allowed to have any,” she said of their relationship early on. “I think that I’ve always been the 18-year-old girl he got engaged to, so I don’t think I’ve been given any credit for growth. And, my goodness, I’ve had to grow.”
David Hartley/Shutterstock
Three Was a Crowd
In perhaps the most quoted, most remembered segment of the interview, Diana admitted to knowing early on that her husband had rekindled his romance with ex-girlfriend Camilla Parker Bowles.
Asked if the affair led to the breakdown of her and Charles’ relationship, she replied, “Well, there were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded.”
Later on, however, on whether she bore any responsibility, Diana said, “I take full responsibility,” before quickly adding, “I take some responsibility that our marriage went the way it did. I’ll take half of it, but I won’t take any more than that, because it takes two to get in this situation.”
Anwar Hussein/Getty Images
Leading a Double Life
Even before they separated, Diana and Charles were effectively living separate lives. When “we went abroad we had separate apartments, albeit we were on the same floor, so of course that was leaked, and that caused complications,” she remembered. “But Charles and I had our duty to perform, and that was paramount.”
And, she continued, “we were a very good team in public.”
When Bashir pointed out that a lot of people might not understand how they lived like that, Diana retorted, “Well, that’s their problem. I know what it felt like.”
Simon & Schuster
A Little Misdirection
Diana denied “personally assisting” Andrew Morton with the writing of his explosive 1992 biography Diana: Her True Story, but she did allow her friends to speak to him, she said, to help set the record straight on her behalf while her life behind the scenes was spiraling.
“A lot of people saw the distress that my life was in, and they felt it was a supportive thing to help in the way that they did,” she told Bashir. The princess had thought that maybe a book would give people “a better understanding” of her. “Maybe there’s a lot of women out there who suffer on the same level but in a different environment, who are unable to stand up for themselves because their self-esteem is cut into two.”
She left out, however, that she submitted to interviews by proxy, Morton asking questions via her friend Dr. James Colthurst, who recorded her responses. Diana also gave Colthurst (who in turn showed them to Morton) a few pieces of private correspondence from Camilla to Charles, the author shared in the Mail on Sunday in 2017.
“However, due to Britain’s libel laws, I wasn’t at the time able to write that Prince Charles and Camilla were lovers, because it couldn’t be proved,” Morton recalled. “Instead, I had to allude to a ‘secret friendship.’”
Unlike with the BBC interview, Morton said, “She never regretted the taping sessions. As her friend filmmaker Lord Puttnam recalled: ‘She owned what she had done. She knew what she was doing and took a calculated risk, even though she was scared sh–less. But I never heard one word of regret, I promise you.’” (After she died, the book was republished as Diana: Her True Story—In Her Own Words.)
Still, Diana told Bashir, the book (which “shocked and horrified” the royal family) was certainly a turning point for her and Charles. “What had been hidden—or rather what we thought had been hidden—then became out in the open and was spoken about on a daily basis, and the pressure was for us to sort ourselves out in some way.”
The sorting out resulted in their separation being formally announced in December 1992, capping off the Queen’s “annus horribilis.”
Bryn Colton/Getty Images
No Affair With James Gilbey
Diana was sorry that her affectionate friend had been sucked into her sordid squabbles when a recording of a flirtatious phone call between them was leaked to The Sun in 1992.
“But the implications of that conversation were that we’d had an adulterous relationship, which was not true,” she insisted. The transcript was published “to harm me in a serious manner, and that was the first time I’d experienced what it was like to be outside the net, so to speak, and not be in the family.”
Jayne Fincher/Getty Images
“She Won’t Go Quietly”
It was Diana’s firm belief that, once she and Charles separated, the royal family had it out for her, that they viewed her as “a problem.”
They weren’t quite sure what to do, she continued, because “‘she won’t go quietly,’ that’s the problem. I’ll fight to the end, because I believe that I have a role to fulfill, and I’ve got two children to bring up.”
Referring to a brief break she took from the public eye in 1993, Diana said her plan was to “confuse the enemy,” explaining, “the enemy was my husband’s department, because I always got more publicity, my work was…discussed much more than him.” They tried to undermine her “out of fear,” she continued, “because here was a strong woman doing her bit, and where was she getting her strength from to continue?”
Shutterstock
“A” for Honesty
Diana cheekily gave Charles kudos to admitting to adultery in his own bombshell interview with Jonathan Dimbleby, author of the 1994 biography The Prince of Wales.
“I was pretty devastated myself. But then I admired the honesty, because it takes a lot to do that,” she shared. “To be honest about a relationship with someone else, in his position—that’s quite something.”
Terry Fincher/Getty Images
How She Broke the News to William
When she and Charles were separating, she went to Ludgrove, William’s boarding school in Berkshire, to tell him in person. She remembered advising her son “that if you find someone you love in life you must hang on to it and look after it, and if you were lucky enough to find someone who loved you, then one must protect it. William asked me what had been going on, and could I answer his questions, which I did.”
She reiterated to her then 10-year-old child that “there were three of us in this marriage, and the pressure of the media was another factor, so the two together were very difficult. But although I still loved Papa I couldn’t live under the same roof as him, and likewise with him.”
Asked how that may have affected him, Diana said William was “a deep thinker, and we don’t know for a few years how it’s gone in. But I put it in gently, without resentment or any anger.”
Ron Dadswell/REX/Shutterstock
Coming Clean About Her Own Affair
Whether Diana would have ever stepped out on Charles if she hadn’t been so unhappy, we’ll never know. But she did admit to being more-than-close-friends with former army officer James Hewitt, who had been her and her sons’ riding instructor (and was the subject of a much-denied rumor that he’s Harry’s real father). He published a tell-all book, Princess In Love, about their affair, which began in 1987, and Diana “really minded” that he had profited from something so private.
“I adored him,” she admitted. “Yes, I was in love with him. But I was very let down.”
Arthur Edwards – WPA Pool/Getty Images
Order of Succession
Asked if she thought Charles would become King one day, Diana replied, “Who knows what fate will produce, who knows what circumstances will provoke?”
Asked if Charles wanted to be King, she said, “There was always conflict on that subject with him when we discussed it, and I understood that conflict, because it’s a very demanding role, being Prince of Wales, but it’s an equally more demanding role being King. And being Prince of Wales produces more freedom now, and being King would be a little bit more suffocating. And because I know the character I would think that the top job, as I call it, would bring enormous limitations to him, and I don’t know whether he could adapt to that.”
And on whether he should be King, or should William skip a rung and become the next monarch, Diana said, “Well, then you have to see that William’s very young at the moment, so do you want a burden like that to be put on his shoulders at such an age? So I can’t answer that question.” But, once he’s of age, “My wish is that my husband finds peace of mind, and from that follows others things, yes.”
Bashir closed the interview by asking Diana why she agreed to talk to him.
“Because we will have been separated three years this December, and the perception that has been given of me for the last three years has been very confusing, turbulent, and in some areas— I’m sure many—many people doubt me,” she explained. “And I want to reassure all those people who have loved me and supported me throughout the last 15 years that I’d never let them down. That is a priority to me, along with my children.”
And no, the princess said, she was not just trying to stick it to Charles for what he (or his family) had put her through.
“I don’t sit here with resentment,” Diana said. “I sit here with sadness because a marriage hasn’t worked. I sit here with hope because there’s a future ahead, a future for my husband, a future for myself and a future for the monarchy.”
Former Speaker of Ghana’s Parliament, Professor Mike Aaron Oquaye has called for a review of the appointment of the Electoral Commission Chairperson.
According to him, the appointment of the chair person by the every sitting President in accordance with the constitution, has always created challenges particularly between the two competing political parties.
For him, the EC chair should be elected by a commission members whose decision will be independent of any interferences, 3news.com reports.
“The Commission members being quite independent, not elected by the president or anyone, will then choose a chairperson, so that the work of the commission is collegial and collectives, then they are satisfied.
“In some places, you will find the situation whereby the EC boss is for a fixed term, 6 years, it recently happened in Nigeria. So that after doing a particular work you go, so that in choosing the EC boss it is usually a retired Professor or a Professor about to retire, a judge who is just part of the system, and then you do that work for 6 years, and then you leave,” he is quoted to have said by 3news.com.
Mr. Oquaye further indicated that the proposed selection process will help encourage a peaceful political environment and also safeguard the work of the EC which is to work independently.
“In other words, there is no end to wisdom with regards to what we have got now, nomination by the President and then ultimate approval by Parliament. Of course, if the president has Majority in Parliament, then the approval is as well as his nomination. All these I believe should be examined if we should have a peaceful political terrain, that is what I have ben saying,” he noted.
The President of Ghana has appointment power under the Constitution to appoint the EC chair.
While the framers of the Constitution have imposed varying levels of constraints on the President’s appointment power for democratic, governmental, prudential, and even historical considerations, the President wields both consultative and approval powers.
The President is compelled to act on the advice of the Council of State in selecting the Chairman/Chairwoman and members of the Electoral Commission as stated in Article 70(2) of the Constitution.
“The President shall act on the advice of the Council of State; appoint the Chairman, Deputy Chairmen, and other members of the Electoral Commission,” the constitution indicates.
The Majority Leader and Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, has divulged details of a conversation he had with former president John Agyekum Kufuor regarding the party’s flagbearership contest ahead of the 2024 elections.
The Suame MP is a proponent of the Bawumia-Alan ticket and has been seeking opinions from bigwigs of the party about his proposal.
Whereas his plan has received some endorsement from persons within the party, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu says John Agyekum Kufuour is against such an arrangement.
The Majority Leader told Kumasi-based Oyerepa TV that Kufuor shot down the proposal on grounds that it is against democratic principles.
In the view of Kufuor, the NPP has a history of providing fairgrounds for people to compete and therefore should not be scared of the challenge of Vice President Bawumia coming up against immediate-past Minister of Trade, Alan Kyerematen.
“President Kufuor has other ideas. He believes the party is a democratic party so we should allow the contest. I toned down because of what President Kufuor said. He probably was looking at it from a much broader perspective. He thinks the party has always been like this and that after the contest, unity will be restored so it should be kept like that. He wants us to leave them to contest,” he said in an interview published this week.
Unlike Kufuor who is against the arrangement, his Chief of Staff, Kwadwo Mpiani is reportedly in favor of the move and has even proposed ways of determining which of the two men should be flagbearer and which one should be running mate.
Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu says that Mpiani recommended the recruitment of an independent body to conduct a survey on the popularity of both Alan Kyerematen and Mahamudu Bawumia.
“I went to see some elders in the party for that arrangement. I saw Kwadwo Mpiani and President Kufuor. Pianim believes it’s a good suggestion but who should contest as flagbearer and who should be running mate. He suggested that we engage an independent group to conduct a survey to determine which one becomes flagbearer and which one is running mate. I felt it was a profound statement,” he said.
Meanwhile Alan Kyerematen has announced his decision to contest the flagbearer race of the party, four days after he resigned from his role as Minister of Trade and Industry.
Alan Kyerematen in an address on Tuesday, January 10, 2023 announced his plans for the party and the country.
“His Excellency, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has been my good friend for a very long time and will always remain so. Based on our shared commitments, the ideals and principles that inspired the founding fathers of the NPP, we have competed in the past but have always worked together thereafter.
“The President has laid a strong foundation for the social-economic development of our country, although I believe there are things that could have been done differently,” the presidential hopeful stated.
A former trade and industry minister, Alan Kyerematen, has formally declared his intention to run as the New Patriotic Party’s (NPP) flag bearer.
In an official address to the nation, he said even though he believes Ghana’s economy will be restored following the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Support Package, going back to IMF will be a thing of the past as the country if he is given the nod considering the country has gone for aid for the seventeenth time over the last 57 years.
According to Alan Kyerematen, to ensure economic stability for the country, a new plan ought to be put in place, one he intends to introduce.
Describing this plan as the Great Transformational Plan (GTP) of Ghana, he said it will span the period of 2025 to 2030.
He outlined some of these plans as follows:
A Strong Macroeconomic Environment:
The success of the GTP will depend primarily on strong macroeconomic fundamentals, which will include among other things, a stable currency, low inflation, sustainable debt levels, revenue optimization and tight expenditure control to guarantee fiscal balance, low competitive interest rates, strong external reserves backed by high levels of liquidity to support the financial sector.
To a large extent, the IMF support programme when fully executed, will create the appropriate conditions that will underpin the Great Transformational Plan.
New Agricultural Revolution (NAR) for Ghana:
The NAR will be based on five critical elements.
i. Introducing Technology and Innovation into Agriculture, through Research & Development (R&D) in Agronomy, Mechanization, Irrigation, and Plantation Management. This will build on the foundation laid by the Planting for Food and Jobs and Planting for Export and Rural Development (PERD) Programmes. Our farmers cannot be competitive without technology and innovation.
ii. The establishment of Licensed Food Distribution and Marketing companies by the Private Sector throughout the country at the district level, to be supported by the Government. These companies will constitute a vital link between farmers and Market Queens in the urban and peri-urban areas. It will be complemented by the introduction of a digitalized food distribution and marketing online platform which will connect producers to buyers and consumers.
iii. The strengthening of the Ghana Commodity Exchange as the marketplace for all actors in the Agricultural value chain.
iv. Deepening the current regime for lending and financing for the agricultural sector.
v. Enhancing the de-regulation of the Cocoa sector by deepening private sector participation in the buying and marketing (including export) of Cocoa.
vi. Mass Citizens participation in Agriculture by introducing an ‘Operation Own a Farm’ programme for the Ghanaian citizenry in general.
Industrial Transformation:
This will build on the successes of Government’s Ten Point Industrial Transformation Programme including the One District One Factory (1D1F) initiative; the establishment of Strategic Anchor Industries to diversify the economy beyond Cocoa and Gold e.g the Automobile assembly, Garment and Textiles, Pharmaceuticals and the Petrochemical industry; enhancing the growth and development of Small and Medium Enterprises; establishment of Industrial Parks and Special Economic Zones; and supporting Domestic Retail Trade and Distribution.
Accelerated Infrastructure Development : Promoting Private sector financing for public infrastructure such as Roads, Railways, Ports and Harbours, Water Supply Systems, Public Housing etc, which will reduce Government’s exposure to the financing of such infrastructure projects.
• Digital Mainstreaming: Digitalization will be mainstreamed in all Government and Public sector activities, building on the current work led by the Ministry of Communication and Digitalization.
• Energy Security and Diversification: Greater emphasis to be placed on developing renewable sources of energy, by fast-tracking the execution of Government’s energy transition strategy, including but not limited to nuclear and hydrogen energy.
• Decarbonization and Climate Resilience: Scaling up Government’s current efforts at reducing Ghana’s carbon footprints and facilitating access to the carbon trading markets, as well as establishing mechanisms to strengthen the country’s preparedness against the negative effects of climate change.
• National Security and Defence Optimization: Deploying resources to strengthen National Security and Defence Mechanisms and Infrastructure, to deal substantively with emerging security threats and challenges, particularly in the Sahalian region.
• Downsizing Government: The architecture of Government will be overhauled by consolidating some existing Ministries, Departments and Agencies. This will mean running a lean Government structure that will ensure operational efficiency and effectiveness in the delivery of Government services.
Strategic Engagement with the International Community:
Ghana’s diplomatic and economic relations with the International Community under the GTP will be predicated on the principle of ‘positive neutrality’, based on the strategic interests of Ghana, as well as our shared commitments for the preservation of peace around the world and respect for humanity.
The Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications has, as of today, January 11, 2023, commenced the implementation of a 1% charge on all electronic transfers.
This is in line with the announcement of the revision of the Electronic Transfers Levy rate from 1.5% to 1% during the presentation of the 2023 budget statement in parliament by the Minister for Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta.
Parliament subsequently debated and passed the revised E-Levy rate before the house went on recess in December 2022.
“As captured in the Electronic Transfer Levy (Amendment) Act, 2022, Act 1089 which has been passed by parliament and assented to by the President, the levy on electronic transfers has been reduced from 1.5% to 1%, while the GHS100 threshold remains unchanged,” the Chamber of Telecommunication stated in a statement ahead of the implementation.
Meanwhile, the Chamber has assured of its collaboration with the Ghana Revenue Authority and other key institutions to ensure a seamless implementation of the revised rate.
As part of the amendment of the E-Levy law, the government had sought to remove the GHC100 threshold as exempted by the initial act.
However, that failed as the minority in parliament which was opposed to the proposal won a vote against it.
Road accidents recorded between 2021 and 2022 have declined by 7.55%, according to the Motor Traffic and Transport Department (MTTD) of the Ghana Police Service.
According to the statistics published by the MTTD, there were 16,182 total number of accidents in 2021 and 14,960 accidents in 2022. Death by accident has also reduced by 20.10%.
The Greater Accra region recorded the highest number of accidents, summing to 5,633 and 370 number of deaths. The Ashanti Region recorded the second highest with 3,372 total cases of accidents and 382 number of deaths.
The Region with the least number of cases is Central Region. The region recorded 656 total number of accidents and 111 deaths as a result of accidents.
In an interview with Joy News, the Director-General of the National Road Safety Authority (NRSA), David Osafo Adonteng commended Ghanaians and all stakeholders including the Ghana Police Service, DVLA, and media houses for their support in making this achievement.
The director-general of the authority also noted that accidents caused by motorcycles were one of the major concerns.
“We have seen the number of motorcycles involved in crashes reduce. Hitherto, that was one of the most critical problems and challenges we were facing; how to hold these motorcycle riders, some of them as you call them ‘okada’ and so on.”
The director-general also stated that it is possible to see less than 1,000 number of deaths by putting in more effort through education, enforcement, and advocacy.
“If we put in more effort, we can make it. Assuming this year, we are able to step up our game; education, enforcement, advocacy, and the rest. And then we are able to do more to reduce by 30% again, that means that we are hitting less than 2,000 and then we keep on moving. Gradually, at one point in time in the near future, we may see deaths less than a thousand.”
David Osafo Adonteng concluded by saying that, if the requisite resources and efforts are provided, the target will be met in a short time.
Thousands of Ghanaians have reportedly fallen prey to a travel scam and have been left stranded in Nigeria and Cameroun.
According to a video report on Akoma FM’s Facebook page, the stranded Ghanaians were promised employment opportunities and visas to travel abroad in a scam which involved persons from both Ghana and Nigeria.
The report added that some of the scammers were arrested on Friday, January 6, 2022, by the Ghana Police Service in Ejisu, a suburb of Kumasi in the Ashanti Region.
One of the victims of the scam, a man, who spoke to Akoma FM, said that he was promised employment opportunities and a visa to travel abroad only to be left stranded in an uncompleted building in Nigeria.
He said that he went to Lagos, Nigeria to meet the travel agents who were supposed to facilitate his travel after paying them with the help of his friend in France.
“I am one of the victims who was stranded in Nigeria. I met the agent in Lagos who took me to a hotel where I spent 3 days.
“The agent told me that I was supposed to have an interview and after the 3 days, he took me to a building in Lagos where I was to have the interview. At the office, I met some Ghanaians who presented themselves as security officers which gave me some confidence,” he said in Twi.
The victim, however, added that in the course of the interview, he realised that he had been scammed when the interviewer started asking him unnecessary questions.
The news report also showed when the police arrested at least six men in Ejisu who are alleged to be involved in the rip-off and a building in Nigeria where some of the victims of the scam were being kept.
A Security analyst, Dr Adam Bonaa has said he never imagined that someone could fly a drone across the seat of government, the Jubilee House.
He explained that the Jubilee House is supposed to be a security zone because that is where the First and Second Gentlemen of the country operate from.
Any drone that is flown across the place is short down by the security and the owners arrested for prosecution, he added.
This happens in almost every jurisdiction where drones are flown across the seats of government.
Dr Bonaa was commenting on the controversial music video shot by American rapper Meek Mill.
He told TV3 that “As a country, we are capable of allowing or doing a lot of things but I never expected that we will get to a point that a diasporan entertainer will walk into and literally fly drones across Jubilee House.
“Jubilee House is supposed to be one of the areas that aircraft, at a certain height, cannot go, you will want to define it as a no flight zone.
“To that extent, if you as a media person, you dared to fly a drone or something for news purposes into the area, chances are that they will shoot it down and whoever it belongs to will be prosecuted. This is not limited to only Ghana, it is everywhere because that is the seat of government, that is the seat of the executive where you have the first and second gentlemen of the land.”
Following public uproar, Meek Mill apologized for the controversial music video and has since deleted it.
In a tweet, Meek Mill said, “my apologies to the people if any disrespected. We still gonna push to make the connection between black people in America and Africa.. What I’m trying to do is more than a video and you should see coming soon. My apologies to the office [of the President] also”.
Meek Mill visited Ghana and performed at the AfroNation concert on Thursday, December 29, 2022.
