President Nana Akufo-Addo
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, through an Executive Instrument, has made the wearing of nose/face mask mandatory in the country.
Making the announcement during his 11th Covid-19 address on Sunday, the President said, “… all Ghanaians must remember that the wearing of masks is now mandatory,” as part of the effort to curb the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic.
He cautioned that “leaving our homes without a face mask or face covering on is an offence. The police have since been instructed to enforce this directive, which is the subject of an Executive Instrument.”
The directive follows a spike in the recorded cases of Covid-19 which is inching close to 12,000, with 54 deaths.
The wearing of face masks in public places was initially made mandatory within the Greater Accra and Ashanti regions.
Public Institutions
All public and private institutions in the regions were instructed to begin a ‘No Face Mask, No Entry’ policy.
The Cape Coast Metropolitan Assembly in the Central Region subsequently indicated that it would make the wearing of face masks mandatory.
Call to Action
The government said it is monitoring through the Ghana Health Service (GHS) the spread of the virus, with benchmarks of health outcomes which define the mitigation measures that must be pursued to curb the spread of the disease and enable it to reassess the easing of restrictions.
“It is important for me to remind residents of the Greater Accra and Ashanti regions, where the great majority of cases have been recorded, and in the Western and Central regions, where we are seeing an increase in infection cases, to continue to adhere strictly to the social distancing and enhanced hygiene protocols announced,” President Akufo-Addo stressed.
He also had cause to remind Ghanaians that “our survival is in our own hands” and that “if we are lax and inattentive, we will continue to have serious challenges with the virus,” insisting that “if we are mindful and self-disciplined, we have it in us to defeat this pandemic and help return our lives to normalcy.”
The President thus appealed to all Ghanaians to help in this regard, saying that is the surest way to realize our collective vision of building a new Ghanaian civilization.
“Let us, together, rise to the occasion and fulfill our common destiny. We can do it!” he charged all and sundry.
By Charles Takyi-Boadu, Presidential Correspondent