On December 8, 2022, videos depicting a sick Asuma Banda, one of Ghana’s wealthiest businessman and formerly thought to be the richest man in the nation, began to circulate on social media.
Banda is said to be on admission at the 37 Military Hospital under the care of his second wife even though his family have recently been pushing that he be sent to Kintampo for care.
According to a recent Rainbow Radio online reportage, two sisters of Asuma Banda claim that their brother has expressly requested that he be sent to Kintampo for care.
The sisters on December 7, 2022 told Rainbow Radio 87.5Fm that they were seeking the intervention of the president, office of the former president and the Chief Imam to resolve custody issues around their brother.
”We know the court has ruled in favour of the second wife. But he is our beloved family member. We acknowledge what his two wives have done for him. We will not be ungrateful to them.
“But our brother has requested to go to Kintampo. And so we are appealing to the president to intervene,” they said in apparent reference to the second wife’s reluctance to allow him to be moved.
The sisters revealed that except for Tuesday, December 6, 2022, we have not seen our brother in the past five years, the Rainbow Radio report added.
”We are still appealing to friends, the business community, and all those who know our brother to intervene. The court has ruled, but we are interested in making our brother better.
“John Mahama knows my brother so well. Nana Addo was his good friend. I am also appealing to Frema Opare to intervene. The two wives are tired, and we want to take over as his sisters,” Hajia Shatta said.
Experienced Ghanaian Engineer, Abdulai Mahama, has charged the government of Ghana to humbly admit they erred by closing down toll booths on the highways of the nation.
The engineer, who from the onset had advised the government against the closure of toll booths, also predicted their reintroduction.
Road tolls were scrapped in the 2022 budget as the government moved to introduce the Electronic Transaction Levy (E-Levy).
However, abandoned toll booths along major roads in the country will be put to work starting in 2023 as part of the government’s revenue generation measures. The amount charged at the toll booths will also be increased.
This is part of the measures outlined in the 2023 budget statement presented to Parliament by the Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, on November 24, 2022.
Reacting to the latest development, the engineer said, “the government must be humble and admit it goofed big time. How can you say in the budget that you’ll probably close tolls, and at dawn the next day you close them down completely? After closing them down, you also promised to provide alternative jobs for the physically challenged managing these toll booths, but that didn’t happen.”
He reiterated in an interview with Samuel Eshun on the Happy Morning Show that “the government goofed and has to apologise to Ghanaians.”
Engineer Mahama also called out the government for closing toll booths with the excuse that they cause traffic congestion.
“What has changed now? The government said they closed toll booths because of the traffic congestion they caused. But have roads been expanded to cater for these traffic congestions when road tolls are reintroduced next year?” He queried.
A 23-year-old Ghanaian identified as Aaron Mensah has been shot and killed by the Frederick County Sheriff’s deputies in the United States of America.
A report by wtop.com disclosed that the Sheriff’s office had responded to the area after Aaron Mensah’s sister called 911 and told them he was stabbing their parents at about 2:15 am.
According to the Maryland State Police, Mensah was instructed to “drop the knife” after he was found with the weapon he used to inflict the wounds on his parents. “After that, one officer shot him with a bean bag round from a shotgun,” wtop reported.
“That, the attorney general’s office said, was followed by Mensah ‘rapidly moving toward the officer’. Multiple officers deployed their stun guns and three officers fired on the man with their guns.”
The Attorney General of the state of Maryland, Brian Frosh, identified the deputies involved in the shooting.
They were Deputy First Class Cassy Boettcher, who has been with the sheriff’s office for two and a half years; Deputy Travis Stely, who has been with the sheriff’s office since September and has six years of law enforcement experience, and Deputy Nathan McLeroy, who has been with the agency since July and has three years’ law enforcement experience.
Frosh’s Independent Investigations Division is investigating the incident adding that the security personnel who fired their guns were not wearing body cameras.
However, other officers involved had theirs on and their devices captured portions of what happened.
“The video will be released in 14 days unless it is deemed to be problematic to the investigation,” the report stated.
The portal further reported that Aaron Mensah’s father died later at the hospital while his mother is being treated for the injuries.
Former Member of Parliament (MP) for Sunyani West Constituency, Hon. Kwadwo Adjei Darko has emphasized the need for presidents to reshuffle their ministers.
According to him, for a government to be more efficient, there is a need for reshuffling. “A minister may be good at a particular ministry; however, moving him from one ministry to the other will ensure efficient and effective governance.”
He said this in an interview with Suncity Radio, a Sunyani-based radio station in the Bono Region of Ghana, following a statement made by former President John Agyekum Kufour in an interaction with the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) at his residence in Peduase on Monday, December 5, 2022.
Mr. Adjei Darko added that the president has the right and authority to reshuffle his ministers. Meanwhile, there have been several calls from some Ghanaians for President Akufo-Addo to reshuffle his ministers.
However, the president insisted that he evaluates the work of his ministers consistently and that many of his appointees have discharged their duties excellently.
The US and Russia have exchanged jailed US basketball star Brittney Griner for notorious arms dealer Viktor Bout, held in an American prison for 12 years.
President Joe Biden said Griner was safe and on a plane home from the United Arab Emirates.
“I’m glad to say Brittney’s in good spirits… she needs time and space to recover,” he said at the White House.
Bout – widely known as the “merchant of death” – has arrived back in Moscow, Russian media reports.
“In the middle of the night they simply woke me up and said ‘Get your things together’ and that was it,” Bout said in brief remarks to a reporter from national television, after landing in Russia.
Bout reportedly came down the aeroplane steps carrying a bouquet of flowers before embracing his mother and his wife.
Griner was arrested at a Moscow airport in February for possessing cannabis oil and last month she was sent to a penal colony.
The Biden administration proposed a prisoner exchange in July, aware Moscow had long sought Bout’s release.
The elaborate swap involved two private planes bringing the pair to Abu Dhabi airport from Moscow and Washington, and then flying them home.
Footage on Russian state media showed them crossing on the tarmac with their respective teams. In the video, apparently provided by Russian security services, Bout is warmly greeted by two Russian officials as Griner, who is 6ft 9in (206cm), looks on. Part of the swap is then edited out before the two parties go their separate ways.
“The Russian citizen has been returned to his homeland,” the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.
Speaking in the Oval Office, Brittney Griner’s wife Cherelle praised the efforts of the Biden administration in securing her release: “I’m just standing here overwhelmed with emotions.”
According to a joint Saudi-UAE statement, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman played a leading role in mediation efforts, along with UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan.
The heir to the Saudi throne has good relations with Russia’s Vladimir Putin and in September he helped co-ordinate a complex swap of hundreds of prisoners held by Russia and Ukraine.
But the White House denied any mediation had been involved. “The only countries that negotiated this deal were the United States and Russia,” said press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
When negotiations began to secure Griner’s release during the summer, the US made clear it wanted ex-marine Paul Whelan to be included in an exchange.
Bout’s lawyer, Alexei Tarasov, told Russian TV that from the start the US wanted two of its citizens returned, and Russia’s foreign ministry complained that “Washington categorically refused to engage in dialogue”.
But it became clear that Whelan, jailed in 2018 on suspicion of spying, would not be part of the Russian swap, dashing his family’s hopes.
Paul Whelan told CNN he was “greatly disappointed” more had not been done to free him, as he had carried out no crime: “I don’t understand why I’m still sitting here,” he said.
President Biden finally signed the order for Bout’s release, commuting his 25-year jail term, in a direct swap for Griner.
Bout’s wife Alla told Russian TV she had spoken to him only two days ago: “He was supposed to call me tonight. Now we’ll see each other and hug each other. That’s better than any phone call.”
Viktor Bout sold arms to warlords and rogue governments, becoming one of the world’s most wanted men.
Dubbed the “merchant of death” for gun-running in the years after the fall of the Soviet Union, the Russian’s exploits inspired the 2005 Hollywood film Lord of War, which was loosely based on his life.
Image source, Reuters
Image caption,
Russian state TV showed images of Bout being reunited with his family in Russia
His secretive career was brought to an end by an elaborate US sting in 2008, when he was arrested at a hotel in the Thai capital Bangkok, to the anger of the Russian government.
He was extradited two years later and has spent the past 12 years in an American jail for conspiring to support terrorists and kill Americans.
Bout’s circumstances could hardly be more different from that of his opposite number in the prisoner swap.
Brittney Griner, 32, is one of the best-known sportswomen in America. During the US basketball season the double Olympic champion is a star centre for Phoenix Mercury in the WNBA.
Her only reason for flying to Moscow was to play in Russia during the off-season in the US. She told her Russian trial that the cannabis oil found in her bag had been an “honest mistake”.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken singled out the efforts of presidential envoy Roger Carstens, who accompanied Griner on the plane from the UAE.
Leading figures in US basketball welcomed her release, among them twice WNBA champion Breanna Stewart of the Seattle Storm.Griner was moved last month to a penal colony in Mordovia, a remote area some 500km, (310m) south-east of Moscow. She was held not far from where Paul Whelan is serving his 16-year jail term on spying charges.
In his statement President Biden said Russia had treated Whelan’s case differently from Griner’s for totally illegitimate reasons.
“While we have not yet succeeded in securing Paul’s release we have not given up; we will not give up,” he vowed.
Whelan’s brother, David, praised Griner’s release and said US officials had warned the family in advance that Paul Whelan was not part of the exchange.
“It’s clear the US government needs to be more assertive,” he said in a statement. “If bad actors like Russia are going to grab innocent Americans, the US needs a swifter, more direct response.”
Former White House national security advisor John Bolton condemned the deal as a not a swap but a surrender by the Biden administration.
“Terrorists and rogue states all around the world will take note of this and it endangers other Americans in the future,” he said.
The deal was also criticised by Robert Zachariasiewicz, a former agent with the US Drug Enforcement Administration, who helped lead the team that arrested Viktor Bout.
“Today’s actions just placed a target on back of every United States citizen travelling throughout the world and they just became a commodity,” he told the BBC’s World Tonight.
“I think we just sent the message that it’s really good business to illegally detain and if not kidnap American citizens, and it’s really great to have one in your back pocket if you need them for a trade at some point.”
Image source, Reuters
Image caption,
Viktor Bout was extradited to the US from Thailand in 2010 (file pic)
Vladimir Osechkin – a former Russian MP who led a parliamentary investigation into Bout, and who is now a dissident in France – told the BBC’s Outside Source programme he believed Vladimir Putin wanted Bout back because of what he knew.
“Putin and the generals were worried that Viktor Bout might start providing detailed and consistent evidence of what he knew about Russian intelligence helping terrorist organisations and organising sabotage abroad,” he said.
“It was a matter of honour for them to take their agent back.”
However, the US Bring Our Families Home Campaign suggested Russians saw Bout in a very different light. “Over the years they built him up like the spy of the century. There’s a domestic political problem in Russia to keep the lie going,” said Jonathan Franks from the campaign.
Thursday’s prisoner exchange is not the first between Russia and the US this year. US marine Trevor Reed spent three years in jail for assault before being traded last April for Konstantin Yaroshenko, a Russian pilot convicted of smuggling cocaine.
Speaking from a Russian penal colony, Paul Whelan said he had been told that Russia “put me at a level higher than what they did with Trevor and Brittney”, because he had been accused of spying.
President Biden urged Americans to take precautions before travelling overseas, and warned of the risk of being wrongfully detained by a foreign government.
India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won with a landslide in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state Gujarat on Thursday, solidifying its 27-year rule.
In the northern mountainous state of Himachal Pradesh, the BJP suffered a loss to the opposition Congress party.
Huge victory in Gujarat
Modi thanked voters in Gujarat, where he had frequently campaigned, as Indian political parties start gearing up for national elections in 2024.
The BJP won 156 seats out of Gujarat’s 182-seat legislature, its best performance ever. The Congress won 17 seats, its lowest tally to date.
“The youth of India have tested and judged our work, they want development-oriented politics, not the politics of caste, family and corruption,” Modi told party workers in Gujarat.
Bhupendra Patel, who took over as Gujarat’s Chief Minister from Vijay Rupani a year ago, will be sworn in for the same position on December 12.
Modi himself was state premier in Gujarat for 12 years, before becoming the South Asian nation’s prime minister in 2014.
“Voters see their welfare in Modi’s political security. This kind of result in Gujarat no doubt smoothens BJP’s path to 2024 [national elections],” political analyst Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay told the AFP news agency.
He said the victory was notable since a bridge collapse in the state killing 135 had been blamed on corruption.
While the state is economically developed, it lags behind on other indicators such as infant and maternal mortality rates. The state had seen some of the worst communal riots during Modi’s rule in 2002, where about 1,000 died, most of them Muslims.
BJP loses power in Himachal
In Himachal Pradesh, the Congress won 40 out of 68 available seats.
The state, with the BJP’s Jai Ram Thakur as the premier, will soon have a change of leadership as the Congress is expected to announce their chief ministerial candidate soon.
The mountainous state has never voted an incumbent government to power. Analysts said a focused campaign by the Congress, and a poor performance by Thakur led to the BJP’s loss.
The Congress led a campaign where local leaders focused on their areas, whereas the BJP banked on Modi’s popularity, according to television channel NDTV’s appraisal.
The BJP also lost Delhi city elections to the Aam Admi Party last week.
As of now, the BJP controls 15 of 28 states in India and is the dominant political force in just one union territory out of eight.
In India’s federal system, states have their own government and much broader autonomy, whereas the central government has much more control over union territories regardless of whether it wins local elections.
One of the largest shopping malls near the Russian capital was engulfed in flames on Friday with authorities saying they were looking into the possibility of an arson attack.
The fire spread across an area of around 7,000 square meters (75,000 square feet) at the Mega shopping mall in the town of Khimki on the outskirts of Moscow and just seven kilometers (four miles) from the capital’s Sheremetyevo Airport.
Videos shared on social media showed thick black smoke rising from a large blaze while others showed people running away through the parking lot.
Russian authorities reported that one person had died and that the conflagration had caused part of the structure to collapse, hampering the efforts of rescue workers.
“Due to the collapse of the roof, the fire spread instantly to a large area,” the region’s emergency services said on Telegram. More than 70 firefighters and 20 fire trucks were on site tackling the blaze.
The mall is one of the biggest in the Moscow regionImage: Sergei Savostyanov/Tass/dpa/picture alliance
News agencies had first cited emergency services saying that the incident was likely due to “arson,” but state news agencies later said that failure to stick to safety regulations was the suspected cause.
The Mega mall had hosted numerous western chains before many of them pulled out of Russia following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
The roof of the mall collapsed causing the fire to spread furtherImage: Sergei Savostyanov/Tass/dpa/picture alliance
A new law is set to be passed by the Scottish Parliament which will simplify the legal process for anyone in Scotland who wants to change their gender.
But the signs are that the UK government could refuse to recognise it, causing huge issues for people affected who want to relocate elsewhere in the UK.
Since 1998 some laws which apply in Scotland are made by MSPs in Edinburgh, while others are made by MPs at Westminster.
Legislation now in the Scottish Parliament will shorten the timescale for anyone who wants to obtain a gender recognition certificate, a document allowing someone to change their gender on their birth certificate.
Gender recognition certificates allow people to change certain legal documents, and can affect areas such as entitlement to benefits and pensions.
The legislation is currently making its way through the Scottish Parliament and is likely to pass later this month.
UK government ministers are responsible for the law in this area in England and Wales, and have no plans to move in the same direction as the Scottish government.
Legal challenge
But they may go further by refusing to recognise documentation issued under the new Scottish system in other parts of the UK.
A UK government source close to the process told the BBC this was “absolutely” possible.
The Westminster government is also not ruling out the prospect of a legal challenge once the legislation is passed by MSPs – it believes the new law may have an impact on areas where policy is decided in London.
Asked if there could be a legal challenge to the Scottish legislation, the source told the BBC “nothing can be ruled out”.
Scottish government ministers have said they are happy to meet their UK counterparts to discuss their concerns – and officials in Edinburgh said they had tried to set up talks in October, without any response.
The SNP-led government believes the bill involves powers held solely in Edinburgh, so the UK government would not have grounds to mount a legal challenge.
Equalities Secretary Kemi Badenoch has written to the Scottish government expressing concerns about the Scottish legislation, and has offered to meet Scottish ministers to discuss it.
‘Nasty Westminster’
A UK government source told the BBC that they had concerns people from elsewhere in the UK may relocate to Scotland to change gender.
And they claimed Scottish ministers wanted to paint Scotland as a “haven of inclusivity” in comparison to a “nasty Westminster”.
The source described the Scottish legislation as a “test case scenario” of how a bill passed by the Scottish Parliament could “undermine Westminster competencies” – in other words, handing Holyrood powers outside Scotland.
A separate UK government official told the BBC there was “genuine concern” about the impact the legislation could have across the rest of the UK. They added that they hoped a legal battle could be avoided.
Scottish Social Justice Secretary Shona Robison has said she would be “happy to meet with Ms Badenoch” to discuss the issue.
Cleaners at Twitter’s headquarters in San Francisco have told the BBC they were sacked without severance pay.
One of them told the BBC a member of Elon Musk’s team had said their jobs would be replaced by robots.
A California state senator said Mr Musk was treating the former staff “like garbage”.
San Francisco’s city attorney, David Chiu, said he’s investigating if Mr Musk broke the law. Twitter has not responded to a BBC request for comment.
“Elon Musk has had a long history of flouting labour laws,” Mr Chiu told the BBC.
“While I’m not surprised this happened, I feel for these workers. We will be looking into this further.”
Image caption, Juana Laura Chavero Ramirez says she might not be able to afford her diabetic medication
The BBC spoke to four cleaners who say they were fired from Twitter on Monday – their interviews were conducted in Spanish.
Adrianna Villarreal, who worked for Twitter for four years, said she’s now worried she won’t have enough money to feed her family over Christmas.
“It’s a sad and frustrating thing for our families and children,” she said.
The cleaners were working at Twitter last week until they were told their jobs were under threat.
Olga Miranda, president of the cleaners’ union, said they organised a strike on Monday to protest. The cleaners were then told they had been laid off effective immediately, she says.
“They did this three weeks before Christmas,” she said. “I think we were fired because we’re a union.”
Image caption, Adrianna Villarreal says she’s worried about how to buy Christmas gifts for her children
Julio Alvarado had been a cleaner for 10 years at Twitter. He says the environment was always friendly during his time there.
But he says things changed when Elon Musk took over Twitter in October.
“People worked without worries,” he told the BBC. “Now we are afraid.”
Since Mr Musk acquired the company, Mr Alvarado says he was escorted by private security while cleaning parts of the office.
He also says he was told by someone from Mr Musk’s team that his job would be obsolete soon anyway because robots would eventually replace human cleaners.
Without his job, Mr Alvarado says he’s worried about paying his bills. He also says he’s supporting his family back in Mexico.
“I can only tell you, I don’t have money to pay the rent,” he says. “I’m not going to have medical insurance. I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
Juana Laura Chavero Ramirez said she had worked for five years at Twitter. A diabetic, she’s concerned she won’t be able to get her medication.
“It’s just horrible,” she said. “We’re not only losing our job, we’re losing our income.”
Adrianna Villarreal, who had worked at Twitter since 2018, said she was worried she would not be able to afford Christmas gifts.
“We are supposed to have Christmas presents for our children,” she said, “a plate of food on our table and overnight we don’t have anything.”
The cleaners say they do not know what to do – as there are few available cleaning vacancies in San Francisco at the moment.
A small group of cleaners have protested outside San Francisco’s Twitter headquarters since Monday.
California state senator Scott Wiener told the BBC the cleaners had been treated “horribly”.
“In the short term, I’d like to see him [Elon Musk] treat his janitors like human beings,” said Mr Wiener, “and get them back working – not just throw them out right before Christmas.”
A commercial DJ, K-pop rapper, and a space YouTuber are to go on a trip around the Moon, after they were picked by a Japanese billionaire for a private SpaceX flight.
Businessman Yusaku Maezawa revealed his crew on Friday after a global search for creative individuals last year.
American DJ Steve Aoki and Korean star TOP are the most high-profile picks.
The flight, scheduled for next year, could be the first lunar journey by humans since 1972.
The proposed fly-by would see a spacecraft circle the moon, coming within 200km (124 miles) of the surface. The trip would take eight days from launch to return.
However, US regulators are yet to give permission for the Starship rocket from Elon Musk’s SpaceX company that the crew is supposed to travel on.
The ship has not even been approved for an orbital journey around the Earth and has been grounded for the past 18 months in Texas, after it completed a test launch in May 2021.
But Mr Maezawa made no mention of this delay in his video announcing the crew for the mission he’s dubbed dearMoon.
The opening scene shows Mr Maezawa in a Japanese garden looking up at the moon. It then cuts to show the first crew member – DJ Aoki – at one of his shows.
“I can’t miss this opportunity. My soul is begging for this,” the Billboard-charting artist says in the video.
The next passenger revealed is Youtuber Tim Dodd – also known as the Everyday Astronaut- who has 1.4 million followers online for his educational videos on spaceflight and astrophysics.
In his own video released on Friday the vlogger said he couldn’t believe he’d been selected. He added that SpaceX’s announcement in 2017 that it would send a civilian to the moon was “ironically, or poetically… actually what got me started making videos on Youtube.”
The other announced dearMoon mission members are:
TOP (Choi Seung hyun), a K-pop rapper and former lead of boyband Big Bang (South Korea)
Dancer and choreographer Yemi A.D (Czech Republic)
Photographer Rhiannon Adam (Ireland)
Wildlife photographer Karim Iliya (UK)
Filmmaker Brendan Hall (US)
Actor Dev Joshi (India)
US Olympic snowboarder Kaitlyn Farrington and Japanese dancer Miyu were named as back-ups.
“I hope each and every one will recognise the responsibility that comes with leaving the Earth, travelling to the moon and back,” Mr Maezawa said.
“They will gain a lot from this experience and I hope they will use that to contribute to the planet, to humanity.”
Mr Maezawa, who made his fortune in online fashion retailer Zozo, has become prominently involved in commercial space travel. Last year he went to the International Space Station on a Russian rocket for 12 days.
In 2018, he was named as the first private passenger due to be flown around the moon by SpaceX and said he would sponsor the cost of eight other passengers on board.
The price Mr Maezawa agreed to pay for his ticket to space has not been disclosed, but according to Mr Musk it was “a lot of money”.
In 2020, he also launched a documentary search for a new girlfriend to join him on his moon voyage, before cancelling due to “mixed feelings”.
Swapping an American jailed for a minor drugs offense in Russia for one of the world’s most notorious arms traffickers known as “The Merchant of Death” might seem like a lopsided deal that could fuel dangerous national security precedents.
But President Joe Biden’s decision to exchange WNBA star Brittney Griner for Viktor Bout goes beyond the exchange’s bottom line. It represented a humane resolution to a painful dilemma that came after tortuous talks with a Russian regime that treats people as geopolitical pawns every day. In that sense, the Biden administration demonstrated the gulf between its moral grounding and that of Russian President Vladimir Putin who is currently demonstrating his inhumanity on another front, with a fearsome assault on Ukrainian civilians.
But the tragic counterpoint to this diplomatic triumph – Biden’s failure to also secure the release of Paul Whelan, another American incarcerated in a Russian penal colony – underscored the unforgiving moral conundrum he faced. And it prompted top Republicans to charge that he had prioritized a basketball superstar over an ex-marine who benefited from a vocal political pressure campaign on Biden.
There is no getting around the potential implications of the steps that Biden took, which followed earlier prisoner swaps with US adversaries conducted by his administration – including for an American and former US marine detained in Russia, Trevor Reed – and those of former presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump. There is now a considerable risk that other rogue nations or groups see Washington as open for business and may therefore see Americans abroad as increasingly valuable targets in a vicious cycle of more detentions.
Furthermore, the return of Bout, who has been linked to Russian security services, handed Putin a propaganda coup at a time of rising domestic pressure. It enabled him to demonstrate to intelligence operatives engaged in nefarious activity abroad that they will not be forgotten by the Kremlin. Those intelligence services are critical to the Russian leader’s continued hold on power as his war in Ukraine deteriorates even further. Still, Biden’s strategy also hinted at intriguing diplomatic possibilities, three days after he refused to rule out future talks with Putin, if Ukraine’s agrees, aimed at ending the vicious war. He showed it was possible to deal with Russia, even amid an effective proxy war between the two old Cold War foes in Ukraine amid the worst relations between Moscow and Washington since the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Another notable cog in this deal was Saudi Arabia, which helped facilitate the exchange alongside the United Arab Emirates – and also helped secure the release of US citizens captured fighting in Ukraine earlier this year. Whether the kingdom, which has relations with both Moscow and Washington and is seeking to increase its global leadership role, might emerge as a mediator over Ukraine remains to be seen. But its recent smoothing of US-Russia exchanges might put Biden’s decision to travel to the country earlier this year and greet its ruthless Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman with a fist bump, in a slightly different light.
Ultimately, it’s impossible for there not to be a sour aftertaste when dealing with an adversary as inhumane as Putin. But it is the job of a president to weigh these competing dynamics within the context of America’s national goals and duty to its citizens.
In cases like these, there is never a right answer.
The most immediate question now facing Biden is how to extract Whelan, whose hopes were raised and then smashed, as he remained in prison and Griner went home, after both Americans were at the center of US-Russia diplomacy.
“This is a precarious situation that needs to be resolved quickly,” a deeply disappointed Whelan told CNN’s State Department producer Jennifer Hansler in an exclusive phone interview. “I would hope that (Biden) and his administration would do everything they could to get me home, regardless of the price they might have to pay at this point.”
The harsh truth for Whelan is that Russia refused every inducement the US could offer to include him in an exchange package, leaving Biden’s capacity to free him in short order in doubt.
Russian officials told the US side that a one-for-two swap was not acceptable but resisted wider options, US officials said.
John Kirby, the National Security Council’s coordinator for strategic communications, told CNN that the Kremlin regarded Whelan in a different light than Griner, since he’s facing espionage charges – even though the US says such allegations are a sham. This added dimension to Whelan’s incarceration will fuel speculation that Moscow may leverage him as it seeks a three-way deal with Germany to free a former colonel from its domestic spy agency who was convicted of murder last year. CNN reported in August that Russia had requested Vadim Krasikov be included in a deal for the two Americans.
This adds another layer of complication for Biden as he seeks to get Whelan free, since it involves another government and would require German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to potentially agree to supersede his country’s own legal system. Whether the new German leader has the political capacity to do so is unclear, as is the kind of Russian concession Berlin might require.
A senior administration official said on Thursday evening that there is a recognition in the White House that the US needs to make available “something more, something different” from what they have offered to the Russians so far, CNN reported.
While Biden is being castigated by some political opponents in Washington for doing a bad deal, administration officials insisted that he got the best one on offer.
“I want to be very clear – this was not a situation where we had a choice of which American to bring home. It was a choice between bringing home one particular American, Brittney Griner, or bringing home none,” a senior administration official told reporters on Thursday.
Evelyn Farkas, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense, told CNN she thought Putin was never going to hand over Whelan and all along wanted to swap only Griner for Bout.
“It’s happening now because Vladimir Putin wants this to happen now, he needs a win, he needs a victory in Russia because he is having trouble convincing the Russia people that it’s a good idea to be at war with Ukraine,” Farkas said.
She added that there remained some hope for Whelan because the Griner exchange did show that “the Russians will make a deal if they think it’s in their interests.”
Whelan isn’t the only American imprisoned in Russia. The family of US teacher Marc Fogel, who is serving a 14 year sentence at a hard labor camp, has also called for the White House to negotiate his release. Fogel was arrested last year in Moscow after traveling into the country with cannabis that his lawyer said was used for medical purposes.
The fierce political divides that now challenge every US foreign policy decision did not take long to bubble over after Griner was freed – alongside a more vicious reaction on social media as some conservatives questioned her patriotism.
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, the top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he was relieved Griner was free but raised questions about the wisdom of such exchanges and whether they could endanger other Americans.
“I think the challenge this points to is these regimes know this. This is why (President Nicolas) Maduro traded five Citgo executives – who were lured to Venezuela to get arrested – for his nephews who are convicted drug traffickers,” Rubio said.
“That’s why you trade a professional basketball player with CBD oil for the Merchant of Death. These are bad trades,” he said.
Another Republican, Rep. Mike Waltz of Florida described the deal to free Griner in a Twitter post as “shameful” and accused the administration of “giving priority to a celebrity over a veteran.”
In a later interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper, Waltz said: “This is a tactical victory, I am glad she is coming home. But this is a strategic loss.”
“The reason the Iranian regime, the Taliban, Putin himself, continue to take Americans hostage is we continue to make concessions. When do we start dictating the terms to these regimes?”
Whelan’s family reacted with great dignity in welcoming Griner’s release, despite their devastation that their brother did not come home. Elizabeth Whelan, Paul’s sister, called for political unity over the fate of hostages abroad, saying that hostile foreign countries are trying to use such cases to stir dissent in the US.
Whelan also urged people to understand the human angle of Biden’s dilemma despite the grave geopolitical issues at stake.
“It’s an amazing thing to be able to get Brittney back. It’s a win for us,” she said.
“We tend to always look at what is Russia getting out of this? … We are getting a wrongfully detained American back home. It’s something to celebrate.”
Heavily trailed, hugely anticipated – but did ‘Harry and Meghan’ make good TV?
If you watched the trailers and thought Harry & Meghan, Netflix‘s heavily promoted new series, was going to be explosive, prepare to be disappointed.
Unless you are an individual member of the Royal Family, in which case, you might be opening the champagne – a drink, we learnt from this new show, that Harry doesn’t usually enjoy.
To put it kindly, this is slow-burn television.
Volume One, as it was rather grandiosely titled, came out in three episodes on Thursday.
Perhaps Volume Two, for which we must wait another week, will get to the details so tantalisingly alluded to in those trailers: who leaked and planted stories about the couple? Who was fighting a “war against Meghan to suit other people’s agendas”? Who was playing a “dirty game”?
What we got – over almost three hours – were new, private details of their “great love story”, as Harry put it. Think soft focus lenses, Nina Simone playing in the background, lots of private photographs, videos and even, apparently, a call between Meghan and a friend as she was getting engaged (“OMG it’s happening” she says).
Also discussed at length through the first volume is harassment by the media. Harry calls it his duty to “uncover this exploitation and bribery”.
More damagingly, the programmes build up a sense that Britain has an endemic problem with structural racism, particularly in relation to the Royal Family and the media.
Historian and TV presenter David Olusoga describes the optimism many Britons of colour (and others) felt about Meghan’s arrival into the heart of the Royal Family. “There was a hope maybe of having difficult conversations that have been pushed away so many times”. Subtext, addressed later – it wasn’t to be.
But these three episodes were broadbrush, rather than aimed at specific individuals.
Netflix has billed Harry & Meghan as an “unprecedented and in-depth documentary series”.
But the programme, unsurprisingly, was heavily one-sided and selective.
At one point, Meghan describes the media interview and photocall the couple gave when they got engaged as an “orchestrated reality show”.
Image source, PETER NICHOLLS
Image caption,
The couples went on an unexpected walkabout together in Windsor, ahead of the funeral of the Queen
Is that what Netflix’s Harry & Meghan, produced in association with the couple’s company, is?
Interestingly, they began recording video diaries in March 2020, as they stepped away from royal duties. That was many months before their Netflix deal was announced.
This is their truth in the hands of the Netflix professionals, a slickly produced narrative about a couple who fell in love and had to sacrifice everything as they butted up against systems, protocols and racism.
The Royal Family – we are told at the start – didn’t choose to make any comment for the programme makers. Both Kensington Palace and Buckingham Palace confirmed they received an email purporting to be from a production company from an unknown organisation’s address and attempted to verify its authenticity with Archewell Productions and Netflix, but did not receive a response, PA reported.
A source told PA the substance of the email did not address the entire series.
So what we have is carefully curated to back up the couple.
Netflix is adept at the modern language of television which steers us through the story. The couple met on social media – perhaps the first royals to do so and certainly a great advert for Instagram. Their early messages are shared with us, popping up on screen in a device so often used by TV in our tech age.
The interviews with Harry set up his wife as the true heir to his mother, Princess Diana. He says Meghan has the “same empathy, the same warmth”. The show regularly cuts to archive footage of Diana, as Harry discusses his fears that history could repeat itself.
Image source, Reuters
Image caption,
Prince Harry (seen here with Princess Diana in 1988) says she made decisions from her heart, and he says he is “his mother’s son”
There are also narrative cliffhangers to keep us watching.
Harry describes trying to deal with the loss of his mother “without much support or help or guidance”, and describes his “second family” in Africa, a group of friends “that literally brought me up”.
Where was his father? We can’t help asking.
He talks about how male royals tend to marry women “who fit in the mould” instead of for love. Is he inferring that’s what his brother did? Does Volume Two answer that question?
Meghan mentions her first meeting with Kate and William, when as “a hugger” she was informal and tactile. She says that is “jarring for some Brits”. Are we supposed to read more into that, after all the stories about the breakdown of relations between the couples?
These teasers frankly help along a narrative that gets a little repetitive at times.
The programme seems made primarily for an American audience. And Harry has embraced the language of the US West Coast. He talks about how, just before news of their relationship broke, they went out for one last secret night and managed to “pull the pin on the fun brigade”.
We hear about “lived experience” and “cause-driven work”.
But if you were tuning in for jaw-dropping revelations, Prince Charles on Dimbleby, Prince Andrew on Newsnight, Princess Diana on Panorama this was not.
Image source, PA
Image caption,
In Jonathan Dimbleby’s ITV documentary in 1994, Prince Charles said he was faithful to his wife until it became clear that the marriage was “irretrievably broken”
This new Netflix show wasn’t even Meghan and Harry on Oprah.
That was the last time the couple endeavoured to tell their truth.
In that bombshell interview, they told Oprah about overt racism by a member of the Royal Family about what colour their future son’s skin might be. We don’t hear anything about that over the three episodes. Who said it still remains a mystery.
Image source, Harpo Productions – Joe Pugliese
Image caption,
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex told Oprah Winfrey that there were “several conversations” within the Royal Family about how dark their baby might be
But Harry does talk about his own journey to understand “unconscious bias”. He also addresses some of the racism of which he has been accused in the past, describing how “ashamed” he felt after he wore a Nazi uniform costume to a party in 2005.
The programme shows him on a journey of constant discovery and self analysis about racism.
It’s left to other contributors to raise Britain’s history around the slave trade, as well as the “skeletons in the closet” in the Royal Family.
But in the end, will this programme persuade anyone to change their opinions?
After the show and then Harry’s book, Spare, is published in January, the couple’s “truth” will be fully out there. Will that be enough for them?
Their currency might begin to wane as they struggle with the law of diminishing returns. They may still want to battle royal institutions and the media, but it may turn out that their real battle will be with ongoing relevancy.
Rishi Sunak is set to announce a collaboration between the UK, Italy and Japan to develop a new fighter jet that uses artificial intelligence.
The prime minister says the joint venture aims to create thousands of UK jobs and strengthen security ties.
The nations will develop a next generation fighter – due to enter service in the mid-2030s – that will eventually replace the Typhoon jet.
It is hoped the new Tempest jet will carry the latest weapons.
Work on developing it is already under way – with the aim to create a combat aircraft that will provide speed stealth, use advanced sensors and even artificial intelligence to assist the human pilot when they are overwhelmed, or under extreme stress.
It could also be flown without a pilot’s input if required and could be able to fire hypersonic missiles.
But building such a complex aircraft is extremely expensive – developing the F35 jet was the most expensive programme ever undertaken by the Pentagon – so Britain has been looking for partners.
Italy was already on board, and the addition of Japan is a significant move – at a time when Britain is building closer ties with allies in the Indo-Pacific region worried about a more assertive China.
Other countries could still join the programme. France, Germany and Spain are already working together on their own separate design – as is the United States.
For the UK, this agreement is not just about security but also economics. The hope is that developing a new fighter jet could create and sustain thousands of UK jobs and open doors to more arms exports.
Mr Sunak will launch the first major phase of the programme during a visit to RAF Coningsby, in Lincolnshire, on Friday.
Ahead of the visit, he said: “The security of the United Kingdom, both today and for future generations, will always be of paramount importance to this government.
“That’s why we need to stay at the cutting-edge of advancements in defence technology – outpacing and out-manoeuvring those who seek to do us harm.
“The international partnership we have announced today with Italy and Japan aims to do just that, underlining that the security of the Euro-Atlantic and Indo-Pacific regions are indivisible.
“The next-generation of combat aircraft we design will protect us and our allies around the world by harnessing the strength of our world-beating defence industry – creating jobs while saving lives.”
John Healey, Labour’s shadow defence secretary, said his party backed the partnership but warned about training.
“Ministers must make clear how this fits with wider plans for the RAF’s future, including how they will prevent delays in fast-jet pilot training,” he said.
For 28 minutes in April, Deanna Violet Coco blocked a single lane of rush hour traffic on the Sydney Harbour Bridge, calling for greater action on climate change.
Those 28 minutes would cost her a 15-month jail sentence.
Last week – in a move that has drawn international criticism – an Australian judge sent Coco to prison after she pleaded guilty to breaching traffic laws, lighting a flare and disobeying police orders to move on.
The climate activist had made an “entire city suffer” with her “selfish emotional actions”, Magistrate Allison Hawkins said. “You do damage to your cause when you do childish stunts like this.”
Coco will be eligible for parole in eight months, but her lawyer plans to challenge the sentence, which he says is “extraordinarily harsh” and “baseless”.
“There are five lanes on that bridge. She blocked one, and not for very long,” Mark Davis told the BBC. Her co-accused avoided jail, he pointed out.
“This is almost without precedent.”
Which ‘way of life’?
The outcome of the case quickly sparked uproar. Small protests were held across Australia, and the sentence was condemned by human rights groups and some politicians.
Human Rights Watch researcher Sophie McNeill said the case sends a terrible message to the globe.
“We’re always calling on these authoritarian governments to treat peaceful protesters respectfully and to not jail them… [but] a country like Australia – who should be leading on human rights in the region, as a democracy – is also jailing peaceful activists,” she said.
Image source, Sky News AustraliaImage caption, The protest on the Sydney Harbour Bridge was shut down by police
The UN’s special rapporteur on peaceful assembly Clément Voule said he was “alarmed” by Coco’s sentence.
“Peaceful protesters should never be criminalised or imprisoned,” he said.
Others disagree. There’s been much debate in Australia about whether activists – peaceful or otherwise – should have the right to disrupt businesses or the lives of ordinary people.
The New South Wales (NSW) state government has said it is “on the side of climate change action” but could not allow “a handful of anarchist protesters” to “bring this city to a halt”.
Premier Dominic Perrottet lauded the decision to jail Coco, saying this week: “If protesters want to put our way of life at risk, then they should have the book thrown at them.”
A political opponent, David Shoebridge, countered: “Wait till the premier hears about how badly climate change will put our way of life at risk.”
But Coco’s own uncle Alister Henskens – a minister in the state government – also welcomed the decision, saying “nobody is above the law”. And social media was filled with similar comments on both sides.
In a video posted online, Coco said she didn’t want to be protesting like this, but the climate emergency required “getting in people’s way”.
“Obviously, it’s not comfortable and it’s not fun, but I recognise that it is necessary because lives are at stake,” she said.
Trend of tightening laws
But some argue the real issue with Coco’s case is that it underscores a broader crackdown on protests nationwide.
She is among the first to be sentenced under new state laws which introduced harsher penalties for protests on critical infrastructure – like roads, rail lines, tunnels and bridges.
Earlier this year, Victoria and Tasmania also introduced laws increasing jail sentences and fines for some kinds of obstructive protests.
The pandemic era has seen many flashpoints of controversy. Hundreds of people were arrested – some for violent offences – while protesting against Australia’s strict lockdown rules.
In another instance, two women who organised a peaceful Black Lives Matter march in Melbourne were also taken to court for breaching public health rules.
Such crackdowns will challenge some Australians’ faith in the country’s liberal democratic protections, says politics and law researcher Ron Levy.
Image source, Zebedee Parkes
But Australia is a “utilitarian” society that tends to elevate the “public good” above individual rights, he says. That means laws like these often have popular support.
“It may be that the more there are physical consequences to your speech, the less robustly we’re going to protect it,” Dr Levy tells the BBC.
But Ms McNeill says the issue isn’t that law breakers can’t be punished, it’s how disproportionate the punishments are.
“People who are charged with drunk driving, assault or drug offences… receive no custodial sentences – fines or just suspended sentences – but then you see a peaceful climate activist like Violet Coco given 15 months,” she says.
‘Chilling effect’
Ms McNeill is among those who believe the laws are “politically motivated” and specifically aimed at intimidating climate activists.
Regardless of their target, there is general agreement they may have a chilling effect on protests more broadly.
Dr Levy says that could see the courts intervene to strike down legislation. Two NSW women have already launched a bid for the High Court of Australia to do just that.
It has happened before. Australia’s top court abolished an earlier version of Tasmania’s rules in 2017, finding them unconstitutional.
But higher courts have also upheld what experts say are similar laws. In 2019, two anti-abortion activists lost a challenge to laws banning them from protesting within 150m of abortion clinics.
“The decision tends to be based on how well tailored the law is – is it too vague, does it go too far?” Dr Levy says.
The use of significant jail terms will be a key issue, he says.
“As a former criminal prosecutor myself, I can tell you that prison time is relatively rare and it should be used in limited circumstances. This does seem rather extreme.”
Mr Davis said the “real slap” is that his client was denied bail before her appeal – something that is unusual for a non-violent offender.
“You’ve normally got to be a pretty monstrous person to be denied.”
He will challenge the bail decision next week, but in the meantime he says Coco is “stuck in a cell”.
Speaker of Ghana Parliament, Alban Bagbin has disclosed that it is his wish to live longer in order to see things as he had once been told.
In his closing remarks after the censure vote to remove Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta had been lost by the Minority because the number of Members of Parliament (MPs) did not meet the two-thirds vote requirement, he narrated a story told him by a senior statesman.
According to him, it is his prayer to live long in order to see things though he was not specific on which on the particular things he was talking about.
He narrated: “One senior statesman, I actually refer to him as an elder statesman told me a story that when they were in school, a gentleman used to visit them and whiles walking on the streets he would be repeating one statement and I quote ‘if we don’t die early we will see things’
“I have been praying to God to allow me not to die early so that I can see things. I am not yet old but I have started seeing things,” he said.
It would be recalled that the Minority caucus filed a motion of censure against the Finance Minister, accusing him of mismanagement of the economy, financial recklessness, conflict of interest, gross mismanagement of the economy.
An eight-member ad-hoc committee set up by the Speaker to probe the motion brought against the Finance Minister presented its report to Parliament on November 25, 2022 but it was debated and voted upon yesterday, December 8.
The Majority staged a walk out rubbishing the allegations levelled against the Finance Minister causing the vote to be lost.
The Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Samuel A. Jinapor, has commissioned a network centre at the Minerals Commission to monitor and track earth-moving and mining equipment, including excavators, and vehicles used in the transportation of explosives.
The Centre, which was built by the Minerals Commission in partnership with the George Paa Grant University of Mines and Technology (UMaT), provides real-time information on the movement and activities of excavators and explosive vehicles.
Commissioning the Centre on Thursday, 8th December, 2022, the Minister said the establishment of the Centre is part of measures adopted by the Government to deal with the illegal mining menace. He noted that excavators are one the main types of machinery used in illegal mining, with its attendant consequences on lands, forests and water bodies.
In 2020, the Government promulgated the Minerals and Mining (Minerals Operation – Tracking of Earthmoving and Mining Equipment) Regulations, 2020 (L.I. 2404), to provide for the registration and tracking of earthmoving and mining equipment used in mineral operations.
To give effect to this law, the Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, on 24th October 2022 directed all owners and operators of excavators to register them with the various Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies where these excavators are located.
The Minerals Commission explained that excavators will be installed with trackers, and will be assigned to specific concessions. According to the Commission, the system has been designed to ensure that any excavator that moves outside its concession area will automatically go off. It said a pilot exercise has been done with excavators in Tarkwa and Obuasi, and excavators that go outside their concessions cannot work again unless unlocked by the Minerals Commission.
In addition to excavators used for mining, vehicles used in the transportation of the explosives will also be installed with trackers for the Minerals Commission to monitor their movement, including their speed, and the activities of drivers.
This follows a recommendation by the Committee on Health and Safety which was established by the Minister after the Appiatse incident, where a vehicle carrying explosives exploded and destroyed the community. The Committee, as part of its recommendations, recommended that vehicles carrying explosives be tracked to monitor their movements and activities.
The Minister commended the Minerals Commission for their hard work in getting the Centre established. He, however, charged the Commission to expedite action on the registration and installation of tracking devices to ensure effective monitoring.
Mr. Jinapor said Government is committed to the fight against illegal mining through law enforcement and reformation. He said while law enforcement is important, reformative measures have proven to be the best means of dealing with illegalities in the extractive sector.
He mentioned some of the reformative measures adopted by Government as the revamping of the Community Mining Schemes and the introduction of the mercury-free gold processing equipment known as Gold Katcha. He called on all stakeholders to partner with Government to clamp down on illegal mining.
Rachel Ridgeway, a mom of six, couldn’t be more thrilled that she is just three years older (albeit technically) than her newborns.
The twins, who were delivered three weeks ago, are believed to have developed from the oldest known embryos that led to a live birth.
Rachel and her husband, Philip, got pregnant three decades after their son and daughter — named Timothy and Lydia — were frozen as embryos in April 1992.
The infants’ biological parents, who have stayed anonymous, donated their leftover embryos to the National Embryo Donation Center, or NEDC, after going through IVF. The Christian nonprofit, which only offers embryos and IVF to heterosexual couples who’ve been married for at least three years, stored them in liquid nitrogen along with thousands of other embryos.
The NEDC was founded in 2002 as a way of helping people start — or, like the Ridgeways, expand — their families.
“I was 5 years old when God gave life to these embryos,” Philip, a devout Christian, said. He noted that their birth was more remarkable because Rachel was just 3 at the time of their conception.
“It’s mind-blowing to think about,” the dad said. “Pretty much everybody we’ve talked to has trouble wrapping their brain around it.”
The Ridgeways, who had four kids aged between the ages of 2 and 8, initially approached the NEDC in December 2019.
“We needed some fertility assistance to conceive our three oldest children,” said Rachel, who took the hormone-boosting medication Clomid.
The couple used the money they would have spent on fertility treatments to pay for their adoption of the frozen embryos
They hoped to welcome their fourth child in 2020. They chose to “adopt” a frozen embryo from the NEDC, based in Knoxville, Tennessee.
“We decided to put the money that we would normally use for fertility care towards embryo adoption,” Rachel said. “We wanted to follow that route.”
Matters changed a few months later when they were surprised to naturally conceive their fourth child, now aged 2.
But they were determined to have more kids. They revisited their plan.
Philip said that they were motivated by their religious beliefs. “We’ve always thought, ‘Let’s have as many kids that God wants to give us,” the 35-year-old said. “We thought, ‘We’re not done yet if that’s God’s will.’”
The couple, who live in Vancouver, Washington, selected their embryos in December 2021 from the so-called “special consideration” section of the NEDC.
“These embryos are often overlooked because they were donated by parents who had a known history of certain genetic disorders,” Rachel said.
The Ridgeways said that they didn’t care whether the 30-year-old embryos were considered perfect or not
“We found out that these kids are rarely looked at because many parents coming into the process are wondering what they could have,” Rachel said.
The mom added, “It didn’t really matter to us if they’re considered perfect or not.” The 34-year-old said they were told that the twins’ biological father had died from ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.
“There’s a possibility that it could be a genetic disorder that they may or may not have,” Rachel said. “But we didn’t care.”
Philip told Insider that, unlike some of the would-be parents, they weren’t bothered about the age of the embryos.
Three of them were transferred, and two developed. Rachel, who had a relatively straightforward pregnancy, gave birth on October 31, 2022, at 38 weeks.
The twins’ record-breaking delivery was verified by the University of Tennessee Preston Medical Library. The former record-holder was a child named Molly Gibson, who was born in 2017. The frozen embryo that later became Molly had been stored for 24 years.
As for the Ridgeways, they told Insider that they hadn’t chosen the 30-year-old embryos for the publicity.
The parents plan to tell the twins the story of their conception in 1992 when they’re older
They are united in the way that they will raise their twins. “Our plans for the twins is to make sure their adoption is a part of their story,” Rachel said. “We want to keep it as a normal part of their lives.”
She said that the family would tell them about their origin once they were able to understand.
“They’ll always know that they are adopted,” Rachel added. “We want to make sure that they know that embryo adoption makes them special.”
Member of Parliament for Ajumako Enyan-Esiam Constituency in the Central Region of Ghana, Cassiel Ato Forson has asked members of parliament to, as a matter of urgency, act to ensure the removal of the finance minister from office to save the country.
The ranking member on the finance committee of the parliament alleged that, due to the mismanagement of the economy by the finance minter Ken Ofori Atta, Ghanaians are leaving the country for neighbouring countries.
“Mr, Speaker, it should be noted that if you are to meet an average Ghanaian or ordinary Ghanaian, their wish is to leave the country, sadly, their wish is to leave the country.
Mr Speaker, if we do not act now, we will wake up one day and we will not have constituents, Mr speaker almost everybody will leave our country to Togo and we will have no country if you fail to act,” he said.
The National Democratic Congress (NDC) MP said this in his submission on the floor of parliament when the house debated the report of an ad hoc committee that looked into a vote censure that was before the Minister of Finance, by the Minority.
The censure motion against Ken Ofori-Atta is grounded, among other things, on accusations of financial recklessness, conflict of interest, and gross mismanagement of the economy against the minister.
Meanwhile, the minority in parliament is confident that the motion against the minister will succeed.
The Member of Parliament (MP) for Ningo-Prampram, Sam Nartey George, has commended the government for the construction of a road bridge over the Tema-Mpakadan railway, which passes through his constituency.
The MP, after thanking the government for the road bridge and resolving other issues that came up in the course of the construction of the Tema-Mpakadan railway, appeared to be mocking the president over the nature of roads in his constituency.
“My sincere gratitude to the Minister of Railways, Honourable John Peter Amewu, who has shown such great commitment to the people of Prampram.
“During the construction of this railway, there have been issues in the community at Afianya and Ablekuma, and the ministry has always responded expeditiously with the contractor whenever I have reached out to them.
“Mr president as I sit, once again our roads, please do something about it. Addo Show Boy show us something,” the MP said at the commissioning of the road bridge.
Watch the MP’s remarks below:
‘Addo Show Boy show us something’ – Sam George taunts Akufo-Addo
‘Addo Show Boy show us something’ – Sam George taunts Akufo-Addo
When Apple’s manufacturing hub in Zhengzhou, China, temporarily shut down in November, it was clear Apple needed to rethink its supply chain.
The shutdown, which could reportedly result in a shortage of 6 million iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max units, means wait times are now stretching past the holiday season. On Saturday, the WSJ reported that Apple was accelerating the expansion of its manufacturing base outside of China.
But any shift out of China won’t be quick, with over 35% of factories supplying Apple currently located in China. Some estimates say it will take until the end of the decade to move 10% of Apple’s iPhone manufacturing out of the country. Moreover, what would happen to Apple’s generous hardware margins as it attempts to leave China is unclear.
Breaking up is hard to do
While Apple sources its chips from several factories in India, Vietnam, and China, the largest supplier is the Chinese Foxconn factory that shut down after protests over China’s “zero Covid” policy.
Apple began making plans to move more of its production outside of China in May this year after experiencing one bout of supply chain delays following shutdowns due to the zero-Covid policy and protests surrounding it.
Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said in an analyst note that zero Covid policy is the last straw for the company.
“The reality is that Apple is extremely limited in their options for the holiday season and are at the mercy of China’s zero-Covid policy,” Ives said. “Now it’s the painful waiting game to see what ramped production looks like over the next week for Apple to ease some iPhone shortages that are building globally.”
But any move will take time. Ives and Wedbush estimated it would take until 2025 or 2026 for 50% of Apple’s iPhone production to move to India and Vietnam if Apple moved “aggressively.”
In a September report, Bloomberg Intelligence was even more pessimistic, saying it would take eight years, or until 2030, to move 10% of Apple’s production capacity out of China in a best-case scenario, or 20% if Apple moved more aggressively. Bloomberg Intelligence estimates that 98% of iPhones are assembled in China, thanks to the supply chain Apple has built over the past 20 years.
Based on Insider’s analysis of Apple’s fiscal year 2021 Supplier List, which catalogs the 191 suppliers in 744 locations, Apple has 262 suppliers in mainland China, comprising 35.2% of all listed suppliers. (In addition, it has 71 in Taiwan, and US-China tensions could also hamper Taiwanese production.)
Apple’s list only includes supplier locations and does not specify manufacturing capacity.
Currently, there are 28 Apple suppliers in Vietnam, or 3.8% of total listed by Apple. India has just 11, or 1.5%. According to the Wall Street Journal, Apple wants to bring its iPhone production to 40% to 45% in India and increase manufacturing of Airpods, laptops, and Apple Watches from Vietnam.
However, both countries need more reliable infrastructure, per the WSJ. Vietnam’s population is considerably smaller than China, and Apple faces challenges navigating India’s bureaucracy.
Onshoring iPhone production?There is another alternative: The US, which has 84 locations supplying Apple already.
On Tuesday, TSMC announced it’s investing $40 billion to open two chip fabrication plants in Arizona that could eventually produce 600,000 advanced chips per year. Tim Cook tweeted that the factory “marks a new era of advanced manufacturing in the U.S. — and we are proud to become the site’s largest customer.”
Bloomberg reported TSMC will start making 4-nanometer chips in its planned Arizona plant at the urging of companies like Apple. TSMC also said it wants to make more advanced 3-nanometer chips in a second planned factory.
However, TSMC’s 4-nanometer chip plant won’t begin production until 2024, and its 3-nanometer chip plant won’t open until 2026. Even once opened, ramping up production in a new plant takes several years as the factory works out its kinks and slowly builds up its workforce. And TSMC estimates chips made in the US would cost 50% more than those made in Taiwan.
If Apple wants to rely less on China, it can do it. The world’s most valuable company is a sharp and savvy supply chain operator. Before Tim Cook took over at Apple, he spent a decade managing its logistics — including shutting down Apple-owned factories and replacing them with contractors that make up Apple’s modern supply chain.
Shifting away from China would require Apple to sacrifice time and money on a long-term project involving hundreds of moving parts. Last quarter, Apple maintained 43% gross margins, one of the reasons its stock has stayed relatively more resilient than its Big Tech peers. Swapping out the largest part of its supply chain would inevitably introduce inefficiencies that would shrink those margins.
Apple is also big enough to take the hit — it just needs to wait things out. The question is, would investors?
Next on Business Insider
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Ancient Egyptian mummies have been discovered with golden tongues inserted in their mouths.
Researchers believe they were meant to help the dead talk with Osiris, the god of the underworld, per The Daily Mail.
The mummies were found in the Quewaisna necropolis, about 40 miles south of Cairo in Egypt, the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities said in a Facebook post on November 24.
It is the latest in a series of mummies found with gold tongues in the mouth.
Last year, archaeologists reported finding mummies with gold tongues twice, once in El Bahnasa, about 136 miles south of Cairo, and once in Alexandria.
Those mummies were about 2,500 and about 2,000 years old respectively.
Mustafa Waziri, secretary-general of the Supreme Council for Archeology, said the mummies in the Quewaisna necropolis were in a poor state of preservation.
Gold flakes were also found on the bones of some of the remains, per the Facebook post, suggesting their bodies were sprinkled with gold.
Some of the flakes were shaped into lotus flowers or scarabs, ARTNews reported.
It’s not clear when the mummies were buried, as the cemetery was used during three distinct historical periods: the Ptolemaic period, and two phases in the Roman era.
Amulets, figurines, and pottery, were also found at the site.
Ancient Egyptians believed the deceased could take items with them in the afterlife, so often buired them with objects meant to help.
Deceased dignitaries have been found buried with mummified food, mummified animals, protective amulets and figurines, elaborate face masks, and even boats.
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Member of Parliament for the Nhyiaeso constituency in the Ashanti Region, Stephen Amoah, has asserted that revenue mobilization is the only way to solve the problems facing the Ghanaian economy.
The former Chief Executive Officer of Microfinance and Small Loan Centre (MASLOC) is of the view that the Ghanaian economy will see a facelift should government generate enough taxes.
“Today if we want to develop, the only thing we can do is for the government to generate revenue through taxes, and then cut down expenditure on discretionary spending arm items, things that the government believes are not that important. But if you say you want to generate revenue, Ghanaians are saying no, they won’t agree, because there is hardship,”.
“…but if we don’t generate revenue, the country will collapse, so I will beg Ghanaians.
“…for now, we need to take taxes to reduce the debt to GDP to consolidate fiscal space so that the credit rating will rise, and the country can develop, this is the only solution, no professor can change this,” the MP said while speaking on Okay FM’s ‘Adea kye Bia’ show.
Stephen Amoah further urged Ghanaians to collaborate and reason with the government in restructuring the Ghanaian economy to tackle the current crises.
I will beg Ghanaians to understand because this is the best alternative option ever, he said and added that the same administration implemented social interventions like the free SHS, and school feeding among others, so Ghanaians should bear with the government in these difficult times.
The Marvel actor was carried by Townley and Scott in this silly behind-the-scenes snap from the No Way Home set, which Holland shared in December 2021. The actors were all in the iconic red and blue superhero suit.
A member of the National Democratic Congress(NDC) and representative for Ningo-Prampram, Sam Nartey George, has questioned the party’s current youth leadership.
According to the MP, the current youth leadership of the party has become too passive and has failed to rally the youth of Ghana to demonstrate against the corrupt Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo government.
Speaking in a Good Morning Ghana interview monitored by GhanaWeb, Sam George added that the failure of the current NDC youth leaders is the reason why he will be supporting Brogya Genfi, a national youth organiser hopeful, in the upcoming national executive elections of the party.
“I have seen leadership in diplomacy, one that engages in press conferences than actions. I want to see leadership of courage. I want to see a leadership that begins to raise the temperature of this country, galvanizing the youth front of our nation and saying to them that we need to demand better of the kleptocrats in government, the thieves in government, those who are running down and destroying the future of this country.
“This youth leadership is interested in press conferences, Akufo-Addo, at 50, did kumepreko… and that is why I support Brogya Genfi. I believe in the courage and fire of leadership that Brogya represents. And I believe that he will bring about a sterling turnaround in the next two years,” he said.
“We want to see a youth leadership that will raise the temperature in all 16 regions and make demands of this government. Demand accountability from this government. Enough of the press conferences. A youth wing that will open up the intellectual debates on campuses,” he reiterated.
The party’s national elections are slated for Saturday, December 17, 2022.
Candidates will be contesting for various positions, including the National Chairman, National Vice-Chairmen, General Secretary, Deputy General Secretary, National Organiser, and Deputy National Organiser, as well as the National Treasurer and Deputy National Treasurer.
Others are the National Communications Officer and Deputy, the National Women’s Organiser and Deputy, the National Zongo Caucus Coordinator, and the National Youth Organiser and Deputy.
The current National Youth Organiser of the party, George Opare Addo, is expected to face stiff competition from Brogya Genfi in the National Youth Organiser race.
Two out of President Akufo-Addo’s candidates have received approval recommendations after being publicly vetted by the Appointments Committee of Parliament.
On the fate of the remaining two others nominees: Justice Ernest Yao Gaewu and Justice George Kingsley Koomson, the Committee did not indicate any reasons for not recommending them for approval.
And as many would recall, one of the two unconfirmed judges, Ernest Yao Gaewu, is the man who was linked to the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP).
After he was nominated for to the Supreme Court of Ghana, GhanaWeb sighted documents that proved that he was a one-time parliamentary candidate of the NPP for the Ho central constituency seat.
However, appearing before the Appointments Committee of Parliament, where he was taken through a very tough time, Justice Yao Gaewu told the panel that he had renounced his membership of the NPP before his nomination.
According to him, he is not in a position where his political history will interfere in the discharge of his duties and that he will not relent to recuse himself from a case that conflicts with his ideas.
“Mr Chairman, luckily, I am not a member of the NPP for now. I am no longer a member of the NPP. I have sworn a judicial oath to do right to all manner of persons. My lord if I am empanelled and to the extent that well it will conflict with my ideas, I may ask to be recused.
“I ceased to become a member of the NPP on the 16th day of September 2020,” he told parliament’s Appointment Committee during his vetting on Wednesday, October 19, 2022.
However, it appears his past political life may just have come in the way of his advancement to the Supreme Court.
While this has not been clearly stated in the document released by the parliamentary committee on the vetting of the nominees, the reasons for recommending Justice Barbara Frances Ackah-Yensu and Justice Samuel Kwame Adibu Asiedu, were stated.
In its reasons, the Appointments Committee of Parliament said that the confirmed two justices “demonstrated dexterity in the knowledge of the law and showed character and competence.
They pledged to interpret the law without fear or favour and eschew partisanship in their rulings.”
The report of the Appointments Committee did not indicate the fate of the remaining two nominees, Justice Ernest Yao Gaewu and Justice George Kingsley Koomson.
It can be recalled that four nominees, including Justice George Kingsley Koomson, Justice of the Court of Appeal;
Justice Samuel Kwame Adibu Asiedu, Justice of the Court of Appeal; Justice Ernest Yao Gaewu, Justice of the High Court; and Justice Barbara Frances Ackah-Yensu, Justice of the Court of Appeal, were vetted in October 2022 after their nomination by President Akufo-Addo.
The plantain processing factory established by the Trade Ministry with funding from the African Development Bank( AfDB)at Agogo in the Asante Akyem North MUNICIPALITY is not functioning.
This is contrary to an earlier impression created by the Member of Parliament for Asante Akyem North when he spoke in parliament last Thursday.
The MP, Hon Andy Appiah Kubi on the floor of Parliament claimed that the factory was operational and had started the production of processed plantain to Canada currently.
But this reporter during a tour of the facility last Saturday to fact-check the claims by the MP at the house of records was met by weeds that had grown in and around the compound.
DETAILS:
Seated on about an acre of land, the processing plant seemed complete but no activity was there as a peep through the main production room showed no sign of machinery.
With a small gate beside the main one opened, this reporter accompanied by other equally interested media houses gained unimpeded access to film and to inspect the facility.
Having been officially commissioned four months ago, the facility from careful scrutiny showed no sign of human activity and no person was present during the visit despite waiting there for two hours to ostensibly talk to a caretaker or security staff.
Noted for being a community where the growing of plantain is a mainstay business, scores of traders who spoke to this reporter at Agogo said they wished the factory was in operation to help them deal with their post-harvest losses.
MUNICIPAL CHIEF EXECUTIVE:
During an interview, the Municipal Chief Executive for Asante Akyem North, Hon Francis Oti Boateng said the Assembly was happy with the establishment of the factory but was not functional.
He noted that they were waiting for the installation of machinery at the factory for work to begin.
“The Assembly would make use of the facility as soon as machines we are waiting to see arrive in February next year,” the MCE stated.
CONTROVERSY:
Speaking to this reporter, former MCE for Asante Akyem North, Mr. George Frimpong wondered why the MP for the area would make non-factual statements about something that was not functioning.
He claimed that on Saturday morning without prompting, the MP sent some persons to take pictures of his private facility where he is into plantain processing.
Touring the facility later in the day with this reporter, Hon Frimpong said he built his facility for the processing of plantain into biscuits at Domeabra.
With the brand name Plameg, the former MCE said he would have been able to make good use of plantain in the area if Exim Bank had funded his private project which the 1D1F secretariat had planned to adopt.
“Asante Akyem North is predominantly a farming community and we are sure government could use the yet-to-function facility to assist farmers who deal in plantain to prevent post-harvest losses and same way govt could fund my project to equally help,” the former MCE noted.
The Sissala West District Chief Executive (DCE), Mrs. Ayisha Baton Hor has assured locals that there is no cause for alarm regarding security.
About 800 Burkinabes are seeking refuge in seven communities in the Sissala West district of the Upper West region.
The development comes after unknown persons attacked their community in neighboring Burkina Faso.
Speaking to Starr Today with Joshua Kodjo Mensah Wednesday, the District Chief Executive who confirmed the presence of the Burkinabes in her area indicated security personnel have been deployed to the enclave to augment the district security.
According to her, the Burkinabes seeking refuge in the District are living in fear and are unwilling to return back home anytime soon.
Narrating her interaction with them, the DCE said one told her “they (the assailants) told us they will be coming back and we don’t know when they will come.”
Madam Baton Hor disclosed that before she will get to the place with the security team the residents have already given them places to stay.
“We have isolated places where they are living and we have actually given them three places for them to live, women and children. These are temporary places given out by the community. So now as DISEC we had a meeting and moved in to see the situation for ourselves,” the Chief Executive stated.
The DCE added that in such a situation what they will need is food and shelter while security measures are also put in place.
A real estate company, Waterstone Realty Limited, has filed a lawsuit against the Lands Commission regarding the destruction of a two-story multifunctional building that was originally situated where the National Cathedral project is currently at.
The helpless innocent baby boy was found by a good samaritan who later blew an alarm for people to come around, according to an eyewitness report.
The unknown mother who dumped her day-old baby into the bush has faced the wrath of residents who witnessed the unfortunate incident.
According to most of these eyewitnesses who came across this shocking news, the perpetrator of such a heinous act will surely be exposed and be made to pay for her evil deeds.
The yet-to-be-identified mother who committed the crime has since gone into hiding as both residents and other security agencies have been pursuing her.
“God will surely punish the wicked mother who threw this child into the bush here,” an angry woman said.
“Why would you carry a baby for nine months and dump it into the bush just a few days after birth? Is that not madness? I pray God closes this person’s womb forever,” another woman said.
“This is a bigger abomination and the perpetrators will surely be exposed. They will pay for their evil deeds. How dare you throw a child into a bush alive?” another person reacted.
Justice Kyei Baffour Awuah aka Wofa Kusi, the Assembly Member for the area who earlier spoke to GhanaWeb said, it was good news the baby was alive.
He further revealed that the wicked woman who dumped the baby into the bush was going to be pursued by all efforts to be brought to book.
In an updated report, the honourable member revealed that the case which was initially lodged at the Afasiebon Police Station was later forwarded to the DOVVSU department of the Abuakwa divisional Police station.
He further revealed that as police seriously manhunt for the wicked mother, the baby had been put on a life-supporting treatment at the hospital.
Meanwhile, a thorough investigation by GhanaWeb at the time of filing this story revealed that the innocent baby was responding to treatment and that he will soon be discharged.
The Appointments Committee of Parliament has recommended, to the plenary, the approval of two of the four persons nominated by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for appointment as Supreme Court Justices.
The two recommend nominees are Justice Barbara Frances Ackah-Yensu and Justice Samuel Kwame Adibu Asiedu.
“The Committee, therefore, recommends to the House by consensus the approval of Justice Barbara Frances Ackah-Yensu and Justice Samuel Kwame Adibu Asiedu as justices of the Supreme Court.
“The Committee also request to the House to adopt its report and approve the nominees as Justices of the Supreme Court,” parts of the committee’s report which was sighted by GhanaWeb read.
It can be recalled that four nominees, including Justice George Kingsley Koomson, Justice of the Court of Appeal; Justice Samuel Kwame Adibu Asiedu, Justice of the Court of Appeal; Justice Ernest Yao Gaewu, Justice of the High Court; and Justice Barbara Frances Ackah-Yensu, Justice of the Court of Appeal, were vetted in October 2022 after their nomination by President Akufo-Addo.
The report of the Appointments Committee did not indicate the fate of the remaining two nominees, Justice Ernest Yao Gaewu and Justice George Kingsley Koomson.
Ashanti Regional Chairman of the ruling New Patriotic Party, Bernard Antwi Boasiako alias Wontumi has filed a lawsuit against musician and activist, Kwame Asare Obeng alias A Plus.
A High Court recently found A Plus and three others guilty of contempt for holding media discussions following a defamation suit filed by Wontumi against socialite, Valentina Agyeiwaa alias Afia Schwarzenegger.
However, in a fresh suit filed at the Tema High Court, Wontumi says A Plus in various social media posts made contemptuous statements against the presiding judge who found A Plus and the three others guilty of contempt.
“That my counsel shall contend that the description of the judgment by the respondent as ridiculous and shameful is highly scandalous of this court. That by such statement and description, the respondent is saying that this Honourable Court’s judgement is foolish and stupid judgement. This is a direct insult to the trial judge,” portions of the writ sighted by GhanaWeb read.
Wontumi emphasised that the action of A Plus smacks of disrespect to the court and “will lower the authority of the court in the eyes of right thinking members of society.”
Wontumi in July this year sued Afia Schwarzenegger, Nana Ama McBrown, Kwame Obeng Asare aka A Plus, Emmanuel Barnes (Mr Logic) and Dr. Fadda Dickson Narh for contempt after a discussion about him on United Showbiz.
The court after trial acquitted and discharged Fadda Dickson but found the remaining four guilty of contempt.
The court also fined all four GH¢65,000.00 each while Afia Schwarzenegger was handed an extra 10-day jail term.
Read full details of Wontumi’s fresh suit against A Plus below:
The Ghana Private Road Transport Union (GPTRU) has denied being responsible for the mountain of rubbish at the Tema Station lorry terminal near Ministries, the seat of government business, in the Greater Accra Region.
There has been a mountain of filth at the left wing of the lorry terminal near the Theodore Okoh Hockey Pitch.
According to the traders and the commercial drivers, the rubbish has sat in the area for the past couple of months.
The pile of filth emits a foul stench and has brought on an invasion of flies.
The traders say the rubbish is a result of the failure of the city authorities to periodically collect the filth after it has been dumped at the collection point in the area.
They are complaining that they pay daily tolls for the collection of rubbish in the terminal, adding that commercial drivers are also charged tolls at the gate for maintenance of the terminal but no true maintenance work is done.
Responding to the claims of the traders and commercial drivers, however, the Welfare Chairman of the GPRTU at the Tema Station terminal, Mr Kofi Afful, was categorical to say the union is not responsible for the collection of filth in the terminal.
He said the union used to be in charge of the collection of filth in the terminal but because of political expediency, some people went to the Assembly for the union’s contract with Jekora Ventures to be terminated.
Mr Afful exonerated the union from blame during an interview with the host of Ghana Yensom morning show, Odehyieba Kofi Essuman, on Accra 100.5 FM on Wednesday, December 7, 2022.
“After they have had the contract with Jekora Ventures terminated they have not been able to periodically collect the filth in the terminal,” he said.
He was blunt to say when the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government came to power, people rose to say their government had come to power and that some of these contracts should be given to them.
“So here we are, the contract was taken away from the union,” he lamented.
He sarcastically said a clinic has been built in the terminal for the people suffering as a result of the filth to seek treatment.
He revealed that there are about one thousand head porters living in the terminal.
“They do almost everything in the terminal,” he added.
“It is only in this country that we use politics to destroy initiatives that will help the ordinary person.
“Now you see what we are confronted with,” he said.
Finance expert, Joe Jackson, has asked the government of Ghana bondholders to accept the conditions of the debt exchange programme recently announced by the Minister for Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta.
The Government of Ghana on Sunday, December 4, 2022, announced a Debt Restructuring Programme asking institutional bondholders to voluntarily exchange their existing bonds for new ones.
The new agreement among other things, will replace existing local-currency debt with four new bonds maturing in 2027, 2029, 2032 and 2037; Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta said.
This has seen government entreat local bondholders to accept losses on interest payments set at 0% in 2023, 5% in 2024 and 10% from 2025.
Speaking on Ghana Tonight, Joe Jackson while noting that the exercise will have more impact on small investors asked the investors to accept the programme no matter how bad may be.
“At this moment, individuals who were wealthy enough to buy bonds in their own names are not being touched, Treasury Bills are not being touched. It is corporates that are being touched,” he said.
Describing the situation as unfortunate, Joe Jackson added that, “the smaller investor who is not rich enough to buy bonds in his name is now indirectly, being affected because that investor joined a corporate investment scheme, and the scheme being a corporate entity has been affected by the haircut.
“At this moment, you have got to accept it and move on however bitter the pill is, however unfair the pill is, however angry we feel about the pill,” he said.
The financial analyst however entreated the government to ensure cuts in its expenditure to help the current situation.
“The government must also cut expenditure , this is about cutting expenditure too. At the moment, I don’t think the government has cut enough expenditure. Next year’s budget we are still borrowing GHS61billion.
“That doesn’t make sense to me, that is not a nation in austerity. The government must cut expenditure, they must show that they are willing to bear the pain,” he stated.
Meanwhile, various institutional bondholders have flatly rejected the government’s debt exchange programme.
Leaders must be innovative and receptive to fresh ideas, according to Rev. Samuel Noi Mensah.
The former President of the Full Gospel Church International made the call during a sermon he delivered at the Church’s headquarters at Community 1, Tema, on Sunday, 20 November 2022.
Expounding on Luke chapter 5, Most Rev. Mensah highlighted on a great lesson that all leaders must learn from the experience of the Apostle Peter.
Frustrated after a fishing fiasco, Peter, a professional fisherman, had to listen to and follow the instruction of Jesus, a carpenter, to get over his frustration in a spectacular manner.
The overwhelming catch he and his company made after heeding the creative counsel of Jesus Christ, is a lesson in leadership worth catching by every leader worth their sort.
From the scripture lesson, he indicated that there are times when one’s expertise and professional know-how may not yield the expected results. He, therefore, provided some four basic principles to leaders (both political and corporate) as a guide in times of crisis.
Firstly, leaders must not display arrogance in times of crisis but rather they must be humble to accept responsibility and be open to new ideas.
Secondly, leaders must eschew the know-it-all attitude which may hinder them from exploring other alternatives.
Thirdly, leaders must be open to options and new ideas; and lastly, leaders should be humble enough to invite ideas from people outside of their inner circles.
Picking some lessons from Luke Chapter 5, Most Rev. Mensah observed that after Peter and his company had toiled all night and caught nothing, his friends abandoned their boats and were washing their nets, which was an indication that they had exhausted all their fishing strategies and had nothing to show for their collective efforts.
They were folding up for the day. Jesus was not part of Peter’s company neither was He an industry player in the fishing field.
However, when Peter’s back was against the wall, he was humble enough to accept the opinion of an outsider to solve his fishing woes.
Relating the lessons learned to the country’s current national economic crisis, Most Rev. Mensah admonished President Nana Akufo-Addo and his team of leaders to invite ideas from people outside their own government (i.e. opposition political parties, religious bodies, TUC, Academia, various professional bodies and other major key stakeholders).
In his view, since all the measures the current government has taken to restore macroeconomic stability will travel beyond their tenure of office, there is the need for broader stakeholder engagements to bring everyone on board towards furthering national cohesion for economic growth and the overall well-being of the citizenry.
On Friday, December 3, 2022, a female passenger was riding home late from a fun night out with some friends when her driver began acting extremely weird.
According to the victim who has only been identified as Diana, she said it was around 1:30 AM on Saturday when she was on her way back home, using the GIMPA bypass.
She explained that she had ordered for a car using the hailing service, Yango, but along the way, she noticed that her driver made a wrong turn.
Immediately, she said she drew his attention to it but got the response from the driver that he was only using a shorter route.
Speaking to GhanaWeb over the phone, she continued that while on the GIMPA road, the driver told her he wanted to attend to nature’s call and then he suddenly parked by the roadside.
“Suddenly, two men emerged from the bush and entered the car. Together with the driver, they then drove me into the bushes and asked for my monies and phone. With a knife pointed at me, I emptied my bag and handed everything to them.
“They then asked me to log out of my iCloud and subsequently took my mobile phone Mobile Money PIN from me,” she narrated.
Speaking from her hospital bed at the Greater Accra Regional Hospital (Ridge Hospital), where she is receiving treatment ahead of a surgery, she said things did not end there.
Diana stressed that the driver then drove to a spot around the John Teye Memorial School and they forced her out of the car, and into the bushes.
She explained that they sexually molested her before harming her physically with a sharp object.
“Not satisfied, they drove me all the way to the bushes around John Teye Memorial School, and stripped me naked and threatened to kill me. They then inflicted deep cuts on my hands and in my palm before they fled the scene,” she said.
According to Diana, some inhabitants heard her shouts from the bush and came to her rescue. They then sent her to the Ridge Hospital.
The case was subsequently reported at the Ofankor Police Station, after her family had been informed of what happened.
The police have since confirmed receipt of the complaints and have assured that everything will be done to arrest the perpetrators.
So far, the police are on a hunt for the Yango driver and his two accomplices; who are on the run. They are being charged with robbery.
Farmer Nuhu Seidu, age 23, has been jailed for assaulting a nurse in Grupe, a rural town in the West Gonja Municipality in the Savannah Region.
Seidu was sentenced to 12 months in prison for attacking a male nurse in the neighborhood. He admitted to insulting and abusing the nurse and was handed a 12-month term for his failure to pay a GH¢3,400 fine.
In a report filed by the Ghanaian Times newspaper, Nuhu Seidu, who is a first-time offender, was to pay GH¢1,000 to the victim as compensation and GH¢2,400 to the court.
But he told the court that, he would be unable to pay the fine due to the nature of his job. Moreover, none of his family members came to the court or the police station after he was fined.
The presiding judge, His Worship Edward Essel, passing his judgement said the 12 -month imprisonment is to serve as a deterrent to persons fond of attacking government officials in the rural areas.
According to reports, a 67-year-old woman at Mankessim in the Central Region of Ghana has allegedly committed suicide.
The old woman, according to a report by Despite Media’s Central Regional Correspondent, Ibrahim Dadzie, took her own life by hanging herself.
According to the reporter, the incident occurred on Friday, December 7, 2022, at Mmroansa, a suburb of Mankessim.
The old woman was found the morning of the incident by her eldest daughter hanging from a door frame with a sponge tied around her neck.
According to the reporter, the incident has thrown relatives of the deceased into a state of shock, as they find it difficult to identify what motivated their mother to take her own life.
Meanwhile, the body of the deceased has been deposited at the Saltpond Government Hospital, with police investigations ongoing.
The Church of Pentecost has admonished its members against dealing in the production and sale of items detrimental to the mental, physical and spiritual health of others.
The church has, therefore, urged its members to stay away from dealing in alcohol and cigarettes, among others.
In the rules of conduct for members of the Church of Pentecost, issued by its General Secretary, Apostle Nana Yaw Kumi Jnr. on Tuesday December 6,2022, the church said: “In your business, endeavour to make all your dealings and transactions Bible- based, honest and transparent (Prov. 16:8; 21:6; 22:13,16; Jer. 17:11; 22:13). A true child of God should not deal in items known to be detrimental to the spiritual, mental and physical health of others, e.g., alcohol, cigarettes and narcotic drugs”.
The Church stressed its stance on premarital sex and marital infidelity and indicated that members found acting contrary to its position, will be punished.
“Marital fidelity and chastity before and during marriage are the hallmarks of a true Christian and are, therefore, strongly urged upon every child of God. Pre-marital and extra-marital relationships have no place in the Church of God; members found in such relationships should be punished by suspension and/ or withdrawal from fellowship (1Cor. 5; Heb. 13:4)”.
The church also urged its members to be circumspect in their conversations in matters relating to the church and the Ministers who serve in the church.
“During casual conversation at home or at work, do not speak disrespectfully or disparagingly about the Church and God’s servants. Make your concerns and grievances known to the appropriate authority for explanation or redress (3 Jn. 9,10; Num. 12:12,” it stated.
Read the full Rules of Conduct for Members of the Church of Pentecost below.
RULES OF CONDUCT FOR THE MEMBERS OF THE CHURCH OF PENTECOST
• The Church is the household of God, redeemed and sanctified by the blood of Jesus Christ.
• The Church is therefore not a mere social institution, but a family of saints being trained and equipped until we all attain the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ (Eph. 4:13).
• The following guidelines are therefore intended to help you walk worthy of your calling as a child of God:
a. Set aside a period daily for a personal quiet time in prayer and meditation on the Word (Matt. 6:6; Eph. 6:18-20).
b. Always endeavour to adequately prepare yourself through prayer and meditation before coming to the house of God (Heb. 4:15-16).
c. Be in your seat in good time before the commencement of service and participate fully in every aspect of the service.
d. Endeavour, by word and deed, to bring up your children in the fear of the LORD, and bring them with you to the house of God. Supervise and monitor the active participation of your children in Sunday School and Youth Ministry, as the case may be. Do not neglect the spiritual well-being of the other relatives and house- helps under your care; they also need salvation (Gen. 18:19; Jos. 24:15; 2 Tim. 1:5, 6; Prov. 22:6; Deut. 6:4-7).
e. Take the pastor as your own friend. He needs your compassion, help and advice as you also need his. Pray for him always (Heb 13;17, 18; Rom. 15:30-32; Mal 2:7).
f. Make the Church your spiritual home. Love the brethren with brotherly affection and, if you are able, contribute to the needs of the saints (Phil. verse 7; Ac. 2:46).
g. During casual conversation at home or at work, do not speak disrespectfully or disparagingly about the Church and God’s servants. Make your concerns and grievances known to the appropriate authority for explanation or redress (3 Jn. 9,10; Num. 12:12).
h. Endeavour to study the Bible diligently on your own and take it with you anytime you go to the house of God (2 Tim. 2:15; Act. 17:11; Jos. 1:8).
i. Enter reverently; pray fervently; listen attentively; give praise from a grateful heart, and worship God in the beauty of holiness (Ps. 118:27-29; Eccl. 5:1; Rom. 7:12; Jas 1:19). “Enter into His gates with thanks-giving, and into His courts with praise; be thankful unto Him and bless His name” (Ps. 100:4)
j. Marital fidelity and chastity before and during marriage are the hallmarks of a true Christian and are, therefore, strongly urged upon every child of God. Pre-marital and extra-marital relationships have no place in the Church of God; members found in such relationships should be punished by suspension and/ or withdrawal from fellowship (1Cor. 5; Heb. 13:4).
k. In your business, endeavour to make all your dealings and transactions Bible- based, honest and transparent (Prov. 16:8; 21:6; 22:13,16; Jer. 17:11; 22:13). A true child of God should not deal in items known to be detrimental to the spiritual, mental and physical health of others, e.g., alcohol, cigarettes and narcotic drugs.
Parliament on Tuesday, December 6, 2022, approved the Budget and Economic Statement for Ghana for the 2023 financial year.
The budget was approved by the House after the conclusion of the debate on it by Members of Parliament (MPs).
After the brouhaha surrounding the budgets, with some MPs of the ruling government threatening to boycott it and other MPs being heavily criticised for missing the debate on it (the budget), it was passed without any aggression in the House.
But members of the minority caucus of Parliament could not help but mock their colleagues on the majority side over the poor performance of the economy.
Immediately, the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin, passed the motion for the approval of the budget after a voice vote, the National Democratic Congress MPs started singing Sidney Barima Oppong’s ‘Africa Money (Our Money)’.
‘Wanna money ee oga dey chop am nyafunyafu. Wonna money eh, ao money oh. Africa money eh, Oga dey chop am fuga fuga. Wonna money eh, ao money oh Africa money eh, Oga dey chop am fuga fuga. E dey chop am nyaga nyaga. Oga dey chop am nyafu nyafu, nyafu nyafu,” the MPs could be heard singing.
The song literally translates to African leaders using the resources of their countries (monies) for their personal benefit.
A former president of Ghana, John Dramani Mahama, has urged citizens to donate money to help organize the 10th National Delegates Conference of the National Democratic Congress (NDC).
The conference, slated for Saturday, December 17, in Accra, is to elect national officers to steer the Party’s affairs for the next four years.
In a statement copied to the Ghana News Agency on Monday, Mr Mahama said about 9,000 constituency, regional and national executives, being accredited delegates, would have to be transported to Accra and accommodated for the conference.
“The Party needs your support to fund this congress,” he said.
“I am inviting 500,000 willing Ghanaians, NDC supporters, sympathisers, and friends to donate a minimum of 10 Ghana cedis each to help us fund the congress. You don’t have to be a member of the NDC to donate.”
The donation should be made via MoMo number 059 860 4199 or pay into the NDC Congress Account at the GCB Bank, into Account Number: 13-9113-00-00-837.
“If you want to arrange other forms of support, please send me an email- [email protected],” former President Mahama said.
On Tuesday, December 6, 2022 parliament approved the Budget and Economic Statement for the 2023 fiscal year.
According to 3news.com, the budget was approved by the House after the conclusion of the debate on it by Members of Parliament.
The leader of the minority caucus of the House, Haruna Iddrisu, who concluded the debate on behalf of the Minority, urged the government to drastically cut down its expenditure in order to deal with the challenges facing the economy.
“It is the demand of this group that there must be major expenditure cuts otherwise some of your tax handles will suffer in our hands. For instance, GHS1.4 billion allocation to contingency vote, we shouldn’t give him that,” he said.
For his part, the Majority Leader Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu said that the approval of the budget will help ensure that some infrastructure projects including roads are completed.
“Some roads have begun. Intention is to ensure that they don’t deteriorate; they are not left unattended to,” he said.
Bribing police officers to get away with committing traffic violations has become a routine, if not justifiable, among many commercial drivers.
A taxi driver, David Ayensu who worked at Tudu in Accra was part of the unlucky few that got hooked by the law after bribing a police officer with the Motor Traffic and Transport Department (MTTD) of the Ghana Police Service with Five Ghana cedis to atone for his offence.
According to Ayensu, the MTTD officer caught him driving with an expired driver’s licence but he bribed the uniformed man with a paltry amount of Five Ghana cedis in a bid to evade the consequences of his action.
“My renewed licence was seized by another police officer so I was using an old one. I knew I had erred so when the officer took the expired licence, I quickly took out Ghc 5 and filed it in an AMA operational card and handed it to him,” he recounted.
Ayensu said the patriotic police officer returned both licences to him without taking the money. He said the officer went ahead to discharge him.
He told crimecheckghana.org that while he was trying to escape from other patrol men who hooted at him to stop, he flouted traffic light rules and crossed when it had turned ‘yellow’.
The taxi driver said he ignored the police officer because he claimed the cop would have let him go if he knew he attempted to give his colleague a bribe.
“The other officer chased me with a motorbike but I refused to stop even when some pedestrians prompted me. I crossed the yellow light at a point where the officer caught up with me,” he said.
The young man said the passenger aboard his vehicle confronted the police officer when he was asked to get off the car for another one.
“The driver gave your colleague Ghc 5 so why are you following him?,” the passenger asked the police officer.
Ayensu said a brawl ensued between the passenger and the officer but he claimed he did not get involved but his car key scathed the peace officer.
“Other policemen came around and accosted me to their office after the passenger had gone,” he indicated.
Ayensu said at the police station, he was subjected to torture and was sent to court the following day.
The young driver said he was charged with careless and inconsiderate driving, which he admitted in court.
“I was fined One Thousand Eight Hundred Ghana cedis but I could not pay. I was jailed for two years at the Ankaful Main Prison,” he narrated.
Crime Check Foundation (CCF) visited the prison and met Ayensu who narrated his story to the team.
The Chief Executive Officer of Agyare Real Estate Limited, Stephen Agyare Jr. supported CCF’s Petty Offenders project to pay Ayensu’s fine for his release.
The Petty Offenders project
Crime Check Foundation has facilitated the release of many convicts who committed minor crimes through its fine-paying module. This is aimed at helping to decongest the prisons among others.
A new version of the GH1 coin with improved security measures has been introduced, according to the Bank of Ghana (BoG).
“The upgraded GH¢1 coin is bi-metallic with an outer gold and inner silver. The coin has a pronounced rough edge and incorporates a latent image, which appears in a rectangular form below the Scale of Justice at the back,” parts of a statement issued by the BoG read.
Ordinary, this announcement should be welcomed news to Ghanaians because it will help prevent fraud and help ensure that the country’s currency is secured.
But Ghanaians on social media are not taking the announcement of the new GH¢1 coin, which will be in circulation from Monday, December 12, 2022, well.
Some Tweeps have been questioning the time of the move by the BoG and the amount it might have cost the country, given the current economic hardships.
“Useless people, how much will this cost us huh? as for Nana Addo the least said about him the better,” one Twitter user wrote.
Some also said that the BOG should focus on stabilising the value of the Ghana cedi rather than issuing new currencies.
“Under Akufo Addo our currency has depreciated badly n he has introduced new denominations new features on our currency n wiping out some…what development paaa will this bring to the nation, of what benefit is this…Total waste,” another Ghanaian wrote.
The Gomoa East District Assembly has embarked on a five-day community engagement to give account to community members on completed and ongoing ones the Assembly had undertaken.
The engagement is also to listen to other pressing issues confronting the communities for redress.
On the first day of the engagement, the District Chief Executive (DCE) for the Area, Mr. Solomon Darko Quarm, and his team visited two communities; Nkwantanan and Dominase where he outlined numerous projects including the construction of education, road and health facilities.
The team as well assessed community support and services.
The Assembly, he noted had provided Community-Based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) compounds, constructed an assembly block, teachers and nurses’ quarters, provided computer labs with computers, awarded scholarships to brilliant, but needy students, and presented sewing machines to vocational trainees, among others.
At Nkwantanan, he highlighted projects done by the Assembly which included a newly constructed 3-unit classroom block with an ancillary facility, culverts, and electricity extension. According to the chief of Nkwantanan, Nana Obirikafo Gyebu II, Nkwantanan continues to face education infrastructural challenges as some 180 pupils study in one classroom due to inadequate classrooms.
Also, the road network came out as a major challenge with residents calling for its rehabilitation. Nana Gyebu appealed to the Assembly to facilitate the construction of classroom blocks to decongest the few ones to improve teaching and learning in the area.
Also, he touched on the bad road network there and drew attention to the fact that a proposed factory in the community will soon attract bigger vehicles to the area and so the need for the access road to be reconstructed.
On security issues, he said the community would continue to cooperate with the security agencies to help combat crime.
At Dominase, the chief, Nana Okogyedom Safo Kantanka Atta IX, bemoaned the portions of the community which had been dug in a bid to construct drains but were abandoned and called for immediate action to avoid any disaster.
He mentioned lack of educational materials like furniture, teaching aids, and books as some of the challenges of education in the Area.
On health, Nana Kantanka Atta said the community had only one CHPS compound in a deplorable state making quality healthcare delivery difficult.
Reacting, Mr Quarm assured that the Assembly was working to address the challenges affecting education, health, security, sanitation, and road network in the district.
Projects are being carried out at Potsin, Nyanyano, Nyanyano Kakraba, Akotsi Benkyere, Adawukwa, Fetteh, Fetteh Kakraba, Limousine, Buduburam, Takyiman, AprahDominase, Dr. Jesus, Nkwantanan, Kojo Oku and Fiifi Pratt,” he noted.
Specific projects in specific communities include; the construction of girls dormitory and a 12-unit classroom block at Fettehman SHS, and the construction of a 3-unit classroom block with ancillary facilities each at Takyiman, Nkwantanan, and Amoanda.
Setting up of Rikpatt Company, a 1D1F facility at Akotsi, the construction of a 20-seater institutional toilet at Eduafokwa, a boys dormitory for P Amass, and the construction of a 3-unit classroom block at Potsin, are some of the achievements. Others include the construction of Potsin to Ahombrew road, Buduatta road, reshaping of Potsin to Adzintem road, construction of Bambam bridge and Nyanyano main road.
The government is aiming to put into place a long-term structure that would make it possible for low and middle-income earners in Ghana, notably public and civil servants, to obtain mortgages for their own homes.
This is provided for in the National Housing Policy before Cabinet for consideration, which when eventually enacted by Parliament, will allow the target population to use at least 30 percent of their monthly emolument to secure decent residential accommodation, particularly upon retirement.
The Minister of Works and Housing, Mr. Francis Asenso-Boakye, announced this at the Pemso Public Lecture in Kumasi.
This year’s Pemso Public Lecture is the seventh in its series and is focused on the ‘Asante Architecture; The Past and Present Perspective on Spatial Planning and Globalization’.
It was organized by the Asante Professionals Club, an apolitical not-for-profit organization under the auspices of the Manhyia Palace.
The President of the Club, Mrs. Ama Serwaa Nerquaye Tetteh explained that the Public Lecture series is part of the contributions of the Club towards meaningful national socio-economic development.
The lecture was delivered by a renowned Architect, Osei Kwame Agyemang, whose delivery traced the history of Asante traditional architectural designs in construction, particularly houses, in the context of a modern built environment.
With the aid of pictorial evidence, Osei Kwame Agyemang noted that unlike in modern construction, almost every building, particularly residential properties in the olden Asante system, had a courtyard designed with symbols that placed greater value on family cohesion, traditions, culture and discipline.
However, with the passage of time and the advancement of technology coupled with modernism and individualism, estate owners have now shifted to designs that virtually have no place for such values required to keep family history and traditions and suggested a re-look at the situation for the sake of posterity and history.
In a panel discussion, the discussant, a professor of Architect, Prof. Daniel Duah of the KNUST, a Legal Practitioner with expertise in land development, Mrs. Mariam Agyemang Gyasi Jawhary, and others, identified various factors that have led to the deviation from the old, but unique Asante Traditional Architectural designs which they noted was best in the preservation and promotion of family values, history and traditions for the larger society.
Head of the Asantehene’s Land Secretariat and the Apagyahene, Oheneba Owusu Afriyie, who is himself a professional Architect, while blaming successive government’s penchant for contracting foreign firms and individuals for the construction of public facilities without regard for Ghana’s historical and traditional interests, said, “it is not too late for the matter to be re-considered for the sake of Ghana’s future generations”.
The Minister of Works and Housing, Francis Asenso Boakye, said the recent Population and Housing census has put Ghana’s Housing deficit at one point-eight million, a figure which is about 200 thousand less than previously estimated.
The Minister identified the lack of a specific statutory body to lead the planning, coordination and regulation of the housing sector as the fundamental cause of the failure of various affordable housing initiatives, hence, the drafting of a law to establish the National Housing Authority in this regard.
Mr. Asenso-Boakye announced plans by the current government to ensure that public and civil servants acquire their own houses through a mortgage scheme.
The Asante Professionals Club used the event to recognize and honour three indigenes of Asante for their profound impactful contributions to national development.
They are Kwame Pianim, an Economist, Prof. Mrs. Rita Dickson, the first ever female Vice Chancellor of the KNUST and Dr. Charles Badu-Yeboah, co-founder and Managing Director of International Community School-Ghana.
Nana Obiri Boahen, a former deputy general secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has condemned the accusations leveled at former President John Agyekum Kufuor for his statements on the current state of the nation.
Speaking in a Neat FM interview monitored by GhanaWeb, Obiri Boahen said that no member of the NPP can say that the things Kufuor talked about are false.
He added that the hardships in the country are real and the former president should be allowed to express his views.
“The other time. I said that ‘akpeteshie’ (local alcohol) is now GHS4 per tot. Yesterday, I heard that in Sunyani, it is now selling GHS5 per tot and the full bottle is being sold at many places for GHS25. So, the reality of the situation on the ground is that the hardship is becoming scary.
“Yesterday, I read what President Kufuor said at a meeting with IMANI and it is generating a lot of issues. If President Kufuor speaks, who am I to criticise him? And I will never doubt anything President Kufuor says because of his experience in politics.
“No NPP member will not be cornered about the things Kufuor said… I have seen that people have started insulting him, what did he say wrong? Did he insult someone, did he talk against someone,” he said in Twi.
The former NPP General Secretary added that Ghanaians should brace for more hardships because prices of goods and services tend to go up during festive periods.
Editor of the Custodian Newspaper, Awudu Mahama, has criticized Ministers who travelled to Qatar for the World Cup, rather than staying in the country to review the 2023 budget.
According to him, these ministers should have been in the country taking notes and addressing specific sector budgetary issues raised by Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta.
“I have serious issues with ministers who went to the World Cup. After the budget has been read, we expect every minister to come and take notes on their sectors as addressed in the budget. But instead of being there to take notes and review the budget, these ministers go to the World Cup, especially at a time where Ghanaians are agitated and the economy is in bad shape,” he told Samuel Eshun during the Editors’ Take Discussion on the Happy Morning Show.
Awudu Mahama was peeved these Ministers ignored the tension within the majority caucus to go watch the World Cup. “I wasn’t happy when ministers after the budget was read went to the World Cup, especially with the tension amongst the majority caucus. So, if a minister, you stay away from the budget, do you expect the MP who is already agitated to take your actions lightly?”
On Thursday, November 24, the embattled Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta presented the government’s economic programme to Parliament for the 2023 fiscal year.
Amongst the highlights of the budget were the revision of the E-levy from the current 1.5% to 1%, plus an increment of the VAT rate from 12.5% to 15%.
After the budget presentation, some ministers and MPs travelled to watch the tournament rather than deliberate the 2023 budget.
The national Chairman for Progressive Peoples Party (PPP), Nana Ofori Owusu, has asked the president of Ghana, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to suspend the construction of the national cathedral with immediate effect.
The project, according to him, is of no priority at this time of economic difficulty.
Speaking on Peace FM’s morning show, Kokrokoo, the politician argued that all non-essential projects of the government must be put on hold.
“If you know you can’t pay your money don’t go and start any new projects, suspend all non-essential projects like the national cathedral. We’re in crises, this time that we are in economic challenges, and people are taking ‘haircut’, you are saying you are going to build a national cathedral. In this difficult time, does it make sense? Which solution are they giving to us as a nation, the executive budget should be reduced by 60% and they should reduce the number of ministers to 14 in total. It should not be more than 35, including deputies.”
One may recall that, on May 5, 2022, the president of the republic of Ghana, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, delivering an inaugural Africa lecture at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, Dc, USA, said that the construction of the national cathedral was of high priority to him as president.
“I am a Christian in politics who is unashamed of asserting my Christian faith as part of my political calling. It is the faith and this belief in God’s power to transform difficult situations into beacons of hope that has animated my vison for moving Ghana to a situation beyond aid and putting the country onto the road of self-reliance and sustained progress and prosperity,” the president said.
Dr. Kareem Mumuni has resigned from his position as acting hospital CEO, according to the Tamale Teaching Hospital (TTH).
It is unclear what his reason is regarding the resignation.
The Governing Board of the Hospital, meanwhile, has tasked Dr. Adam Atiku, the Director of Medical Affairs to take over as the Acting Chief Executive Officer while the Governing Board takes the necessary
steps to find a permanent replacement.
A statement signed by the Public Relations Officer of the Hospital, Mohammed Misbao said “Staff and the general public shall be informed about any development in due course.”
Cassiel Ato Forson, the Ranking Member on the Finance Committee of Parliament has lamented what he says is the mess created by the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo government for which reason a domestic debt restructuring has been announced.
The magnitude of mess created he added will be bequeathed to whichever government takes over when Akufo-Addo exits.
He stressed at a Minority press conference (December 5) that with Ghana’s debt officially classified as ‘unsustainable,’ the simple meaning was that government is unable to pay debts in its current shape and form hence a debt exchange.
Ato Forson added that by defaulting on its current debts, thus announcing a domestic debt exchange, “Ghana has announced default of its external debts. That is what it means,” he stated before announcing that rating agencies will by close of the week, downgrade Ghana to D status.
“Ghana will be the first country in the entire Africa ever to restructure its domestic debts. We have joined the league of Greece and Jamaica in the last 10 years,” he said.
He also described government’s claims that there will be “no haircuts” on principals of bondholders and their interest as a hoax.
He explained how investors with the Daakye bond for example will record as much as 63% of losses on their investments.
“…the haircut is steep and that is what I call back bow, it is very steep and it is going to erode your hair completely Ablakwa will be better off. So let no one lie to you, we are in trouble. Ghana is in trouble,” he added.
How Ofori-Atta compared the Ghana operation to Greece and Jamaica
Ghana is not the first nation to undertake such Domestic Debt operation. To illustrate the point, let me cite the examples of just two countries among many others in the last 10 years.
Jamaica resorted to such operations in the past, notably in 2010 and 2013. In both cases, it chose to trust the sense of responsibility of the Jamaican people and proceeded through a voluntary approach. This approach was highly successful, as more than 99% of holders of domestic bonds participated in the exchange.
On the contrary, in the case of Greece, the Authorities chose to undertake a coercive approach, whereby a law was passed to force people into participating. We intend to avoid as much as possible the Greek approach, as we strive to reach a consensual solution with our bondholders, which the is Ghanaian way.
In any case, the good news is that the Domestic Debt Exchange has yielded positive results both in Greece and Jamaica, and many others, and will certainly put our economy on a much stronger footing. Greece has now recovered full market access.
We certainly anticipate a similar success story in Ghana. I want to assure you about the Government’s commitment to do what is necessary to succeed.
Ofori-Atta announces Domestic Debt Exchange:
The Minister of Finance announced a number of measures under government’s Domestic Debt Exchange (DDE) programme late Sunday.
He stated in a 4-minute address that the announcement was in line with government’s Debt Sustainability Analysis as contained in the 2023 budget he presented to Parliament on November 24.
The Minister laid out among others the exchange of existing domestic bonds with four new ones as well as their maturity dates and terms of coupon payments.
He also addressed the overarching goal of the government relative to its engagements with the International Monetary Fund as well as measures to minimize impact of domestic bond exchange on different stakeholders.
“The Government of Ghana has been working hard to minimize the impact of the domestic debt exchange on investors holding government bonds, particularly small investors, individuals, and other vulnerable groups,” he said before outlining three main measures:
• Treasury Bills are completely exempted and all holders will be paid the full value of their investments on maturity.
• There will be NO haircut on the principal of bonds.
• Individual holders of bonds will not be affected.
According to the chamber, the proposal put forth by the Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, is inferior to market expectation and will destroy the savings of Ghanaians and further undermine market confidence.
“We have carefully analysed the announcement by the Minister of Finance on the Debt Exchange Programme and are of the opinion that it is injurious to the interest of contributors to pension schemes”, it said in a statement.
“The proposal as put forth by the Minister of Finance is inferior to market expectation and will destroy the savings of Ghanaians and further undermine market confidence. This is why we reject it outright”, it explained.
It assured contributors to pension schemes that the industry has not agreed to the debt exchange programme proposed by the Ministry of Finance.
“As Trustees, we hold a fiduciary responsibility and are enjoined to seek the best interest of contributors at all times”, it stressed.
It further stated that though it recognises that inflation has caused significant harm to pension fund assets this year and that there is an urgent need to reduce the government debt burden and restore macroeconomic stability that should however not be done to the detriment of contributors to pension schemes.
“We share in Government’s call for burden sharing, but that should be done in the spirit of fairness to ensure a win-win outcome to all stakeholders”, the chamber added.
It urged contributors to pension funds and actors in the pensions industry to remain calm “as we seek the best outcome in our negotiations with the Ministry of Finance”.
“We will duly inform members of the outcome of our deliberations”, it concluded.
