President Nana Akufo-Addo
President Nana Akufo-Addo delivered his much anticipated address at the United Nations (UN) 74th General Assembly on Wednesday in New York, with a clarion call on global leaders to crack down on poverty and the exploitation of Africa.
He also called for concerted global efforts in promoting education and fighting climate change.
In his address delivered, Mr. Akufo-Addo spoke about global inequality and unfair trade practices that for him have contributed immensely to Africa’s underdevelopment.
“The report of the panel chaired by the highly respected former South African President, Thabo Mbeki, on the illicit flow of funds from Africa, has raised the lid on what many had always suspected, but did not have the figures to support,” he said.
Mr. Akufo-Addo added that “according to the report, Africa is losing annually, more than $50 billion through illicit financial outflows.”
He urged that “collaboration is certainly needed amongst the nations of the world to stop this rape of Africa.”
On poverty, he noted that “for us, poverty is a daily reality that we live with and feel, for far too many of our people are burdened with it, and it Rob’s us of the dignity that should be the inherent right of every human being.”
The President added that “we know that our performance as governments will be judged by how successful we are in reducing and eventually eradicating poverty in our countries.”
According to the Ghanaian leader, if the world wants to marshal all its undoubted energies to support this fight, there cannot be a better start than acknowledgement and a consensus among the nations of the world that, indeed, poverty anywhere degrades us all, whether in the developed or developing world.”
He noted that “the responsibility is ours as individual sovereign countries not to only aim at reducing poverty, but, actually, to create prosperity for all our citizens.”
He added that “we, in Ghana, certainly are engaged in fighting to eradicate poverty from our country.”
Offerring suggestions to fighting poverty and ensuring prosperity for global citizens, the President noted that “the application of technology can be the tool to set us on the road to prosperity. The modernisation of agriculture through the application of technology could well turn out to be the fastest way to make the turnaround that we seek.”
BY Melvin Tarlue