Today I am sharing an article culled from the BBC News website.
It is the extraordinary and inspiring story of a British Doctors Without Borders volunteer, Cokie van der Velde, who looks after Ebola patients in Sierra Leone. It is entitled: "Why I'll risk my life for Ebola patients".
Monday, 20 October 2014
Ghana Must Not Host CAF's 2015 African Cup Of Nations Football Tournament
It would be a grave error of judgement on the part of our country's leaders to accept to host the 2015 Confederation of African Football's (CAF) African Cup of Nations football tournament.
With Ebola raging out of control in the three nations affected by the current outbreak of the disease in west Africa - Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia - CAF would be wise to scrap the 2015 tournament altogether.
That would be a much more responsible step for CAF to take - instead of writing to ask Ghana to host a tournament, which even the original host that won the bid to stage it in the first place, Morocco, has asked to be postponed.
With predictions of as many as 10,000 people a week possibly dying, if the west African Ebola outbreak worsens, postponement of the 2015 edition of the tournament is a no-brainer, as far as many football fans around the continent are concerned - and it ought to be a no-brainer for Ghana's leaders too.
Having been spared from incidents of cases of Ebola infections being recorded anywhere in the country thus far, alas, Ghanaians will never forgive the government of President Mahama, if any cases of Ebola were to be recorded in Ghana, if it staged the 2015 African Cup of Nations football tournament.
In an age of affordable air travel, the Ebola virus potentially poses a threat to other nations across the continent, too. Nigeria, which has just been declared Ebola-free by the World Health Organisation (WHO), learnt that to its cost, when a Liberian-American citizen, Patrick Sawyer, who flew into the country infected a number of Nigerian healthcare professionals before dying in a Lagos hospital.
Who would conduct the needed contact-tracing, for example, if even 100 football fans from outside our shores - all unaware that they were infected with Ebola and showing no signs of the disease - flew into Ghana and then became ill two weeks into the event, if our leaders agreed to stage the 2015 African Nations Cup football tournament?
That nightmarish scenario simply doesn't bear thinking - and no Ghanaian must be allowed to be traumatised by being quarantined for observation for 21 days because they worked in a guest house any such foreign football fan stayed in.
For that reason alone, it will not be in the national interest of any African country to stage that particular edition of the tournament - which is why Ghana must not host the 2015 CAF African Cup of Nation's football tournament. A word to the wise...
Thursday, 16 October 2014
Let Us Halt Corruption In Ghana Before It Destroys Our Nation
As a people, we must stop the corrupt individuals who steal taxpayers' funds, from getting away with their crimes against our nation and its people. They must not be allowed to benefit from their crimes.
Parliament ought to enact laws that empower the courts to seize and order the sale of the assets of convicted white collar criminals who steal public funds - to enable the state recover the stolen money.
Corruption does have a deleterious effect on the social fabric - and actually kills many ordinary people: such as some of those who have died from the recent cholera outbreak, because of the appalling and insanitary conditions that they are forced to live in as a result of the endemic poverty in the slums of urban Ghana.
Others continue to die from common diseases like malaria because they lack the money to pay for prescribed medication. That is intolerable - and an indictment of our ruling elites: who have allowed Nkrumah's Ghana to become a society in which huge disparities in wealth exist.
Yet, if we sealed all the loopholes in the system that enable white collar criminals to siphon off public funds, we could ensure that the poor have access to: free healthcare; free education from kindergarten to tertiary level (for those with the aptitude to study); and access to well-designed and well-built affordable housing in new green cities.
Yesterday (15th October 2014) was Global Hand-Washing Day. Sadly, in the midst of a nationwide cholera outbreak, hundreds of thousands of homes, schools, healthcare facilities, markets and other public buildings across the country, lack treated running water. And this is actually our 57th year as an independent nation, incredibly.
Perhaps the question we must pose to our ruling elites is: if there is an outbreak of Ebola fever in Ghana, how many will become infected, because they lacked access to soap and treated running water from taps to wash their hands under?
With Ebola threatening to kill tens of thousands if there is an outbreak here (God forbid), why should we continue to tolerate those corrupt individuals in the Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL), for example, who allegedly collude with private water sellers to install powerful booster pumps that enable them to tap into the GWCL's distribution pipeline network, to draw treated water illegally into their reservoirs - an unconscionable crime that leads to scores of dry taps in nearby properties in their neighbourhoods?
How can high standards of hygiene be maintained by families and individuals, as well as businesses and institutions, in such circumstances?
We have all seen how the perennial lack of funds has crippled the healthcare systems of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone - and has resulted in their inability to halt the current Ebola outbreak.
Unfortunately, over the years, corruption has resulted in broken national systems across west Africa that deny millions from having a decent standard of living and a good quality of life.
As it happens, today is World Food Day. It is a day when we ought to be thinking of ways of empowering Ghana's smallholder farmers - who provide most of the agricultural produce that help feed our nation. We should salute Food Sovereignty Ghana - for their effort to keep the multinational GMO seed companies out of Ghanaian agriculture.
Incredibly, our country's parliamentarians, who are not obliged to pass sell-out-legislation that renders it impossible for the Ghanaian nation-state to control the activities of multinational GMO seed companies like Monsanto inside its territorial boundaries, are inexplicably determined to do so - and in the process allow controversial GMO seeds to be sold and planted here. How can that be?
Why the indecent haste - when we lose nothing by delaying legislation to allow GMO crops to be sold and grown here: whiles we wait for the world's scientific community to see the effect it has on the long-term health of consumers in the nations that permit the planting of GMO crops and their sale to consumers?
Based on that empirical evidence, could an informed decision about GMO seeds, not then be made for the nation, by Parliament?
Why don't our nation's parliamentarians simply leave out Clause 23 of the Plant Breeders Bill - and save Ghana's smallholder farmers from the clutches of ruthless companies like Monsanto?
What is the point of making it possible for multinational seed companies to hold our nation and its agricultural-sector to ransom someday? Why pass laws clearly inimical to the national interest and which will undermine the well-being of our people? Odd, that.
In any case, what moral right do a few parliamentarians, numbering less than 300, out of a total population of over 25 million citizens, have, to deny the Ghanaian nation-state the power to control the activities of GMO seed companies like Monsanto, inside the borders of the landmass of Ghana?
Does it never strike our parliamentarians that the only conclusion that many patriotic and discerning Ghanaians can come to, when faced with such obduracy on their part, is that somehow they have been compromised by lobbyists for the GMO seed companies?
Who in Ghana has forgotten the U.S.$5,000 each, allegedly distributed to parliamentarians on the majority side, as 'sitting allowance', during the long hours it took to railroad the sale and purchase agreement for Ghana Telecom to Vodafone SA through Parliament, during the golden age of business for Kufuor & Co?
And if it is true that the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) intends to pay Karadeniz Holdings of Turkey as much as U.S.1.2 billions to rent two of its power-generating ships over a period of ten years, when it can buy two power barges with similar generating capacity outright from the reputable power-barge builder Wartsila of Finland, for less than half that amount, then when exactly will Parliament step in to halt the perfidy of the ECG officials behind that egregious rip-off of Mother Ghana?
Ghana's Parliament ought to join the fight to halt corruption in Ghana. For, as a people, if we fail to halt corruption in Ghana, it will eventually destroy Ghanaian democracy - drowning Parliament in the revolutionary-tsumani that will sweep Ghanaian democracy and its mostly-corrupt institutions away from its furious and destructive path.
That is why whiles congratulating the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI), which unearthed the unparallelled corruption at the National Service Secretariat (NSS), all patriotic Ghanaians ought to also commend the #OccupyGhana movement - for deciding to sue the Auditor General of Ghana in the law courts for what amounts to gross dereliction of duty: in failing to detect and prevent the theft of tens of millions of Ghana cedis on a regular basis from the coffers of the NSS.
Let us halt corruption in Ghana before it destroys our nation. A word to the wise...
Parliament ought to enact laws that empower the courts to seize and order the sale of the assets of convicted white collar criminals who steal public funds - to enable the state recover the stolen money.
Corruption does have a deleterious effect on the social fabric - and actually kills many ordinary people: such as some of those who have died from the recent cholera outbreak, because of the appalling and insanitary conditions that they are forced to live in as a result of the endemic poverty in the slums of urban Ghana.
Others continue to die from common diseases like malaria because they lack the money to pay for prescribed medication. That is intolerable - and an indictment of our ruling elites: who have allowed Nkrumah's Ghana to become a society in which huge disparities in wealth exist.
Yet, if we sealed all the loopholes in the system that enable white collar criminals to siphon off public funds, we could ensure that the poor have access to: free healthcare; free education from kindergarten to tertiary level (for those with the aptitude to study); and access to well-designed and well-built affordable housing in new green cities.
Yesterday (15th October 2014) was Global Hand-Washing Day. Sadly, in the midst of a nationwide cholera outbreak, hundreds of thousands of homes, schools, healthcare facilities, markets and other public buildings across the country, lack treated running water. And this is actually our 57th year as an independent nation, incredibly.
Perhaps the question we must pose to our ruling elites is: if there is an outbreak of Ebola fever in Ghana, how many will become infected, because they lacked access to soap and treated running water from taps to wash their hands under?
With Ebola threatening to kill tens of thousands if there is an outbreak here (God forbid), why should we continue to tolerate those corrupt individuals in the Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL), for example, who allegedly collude with private water sellers to install powerful booster pumps that enable them to tap into the GWCL's distribution pipeline network, to draw treated water illegally into their reservoirs - an unconscionable crime that leads to scores of dry taps in nearby properties in their neighbourhoods?
How can high standards of hygiene be maintained by families and individuals, as well as businesses and institutions, in such circumstances?
We have all seen how the perennial lack of funds has crippled the healthcare systems of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone - and has resulted in their inability to halt the current Ebola outbreak.
Unfortunately, over the years, corruption has resulted in broken national systems across west Africa that deny millions from having a decent standard of living and a good quality of life.
As it happens, today is World Food Day. It is a day when we ought to be thinking of ways of empowering Ghana's smallholder farmers - who provide most of the agricultural produce that help feed our nation. We should salute Food Sovereignty Ghana - for their effort to keep the multinational GMO seed companies out of Ghanaian agriculture.
Incredibly, our country's parliamentarians, who are not obliged to pass sell-out-legislation that renders it impossible for the Ghanaian nation-state to control the activities of multinational GMO seed companies like Monsanto inside its territorial boundaries, are inexplicably determined to do so - and in the process allow controversial GMO seeds to be sold and planted here. How can that be?
Why the indecent haste - when we lose nothing by delaying legislation to allow GMO crops to be sold and grown here: whiles we wait for the world's scientific community to see the effect it has on the long-term health of consumers in the nations that permit the planting of GMO crops and their sale to consumers?
Based on that empirical evidence, could an informed decision about GMO seeds, not then be made for the nation, by Parliament?
Why don't our nation's parliamentarians simply leave out Clause 23 of the Plant Breeders Bill - and save Ghana's smallholder farmers from the clutches of ruthless companies like Monsanto?
What is the point of making it possible for multinational seed companies to hold our nation and its agricultural-sector to ransom someday? Why pass laws clearly inimical to the national interest and which will undermine the well-being of our people? Odd, that.
In any case, what moral right do a few parliamentarians, numbering less than 300, out of a total population of over 25 million citizens, have, to deny the Ghanaian nation-state the power to control the activities of GMO seed companies like Monsanto, inside the borders of the landmass of Ghana?
Does it never strike our parliamentarians that the only conclusion that many patriotic and discerning Ghanaians can come to, when faced with such obduracy on their part, is that somehow they have been compromised by lobbyists for the GMO seed companies?
Who in Ghana has forgotten the U.S.$5,000 each, allegedly distributed to parliamentarians on the majority side, as 'sitting allowance', during the long hours it took to railroad the sale and purchase agreement for Ghana Telecom to Vodafone SA through Parliament, during the golden age of business for Kufuor & Co?
And if it is true that the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) intends to pay Karadeniz Holdings of Turkey as much as U.S.1.2 billions to rent two of its power-generating ships over a period of ten years, when it can buy two power barges with similar generating capacity outright from the reputable power-barge builder Wartsila of Finland, for less than half that amount, then when exactly will Parliament step in to halt the perfidy of the ECG officials behind that egregious rip-off of Mother Ghana?
Ghana's Parliament ought to join the fight to halt corruption in Ghana. For, as a people, if we fail to halt corruption in Ghana, it will eventually destroy Ghanaian democracy - drowning Parliament in the revolutionary-tsumani that will sweep Ghanaian democracy and its mostly-corrupt institutions away from its furious and destructive path.
That is why whiles congratulating the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI), which unearthed the unparallelled corruption at the National Service Secretariat (NSS), all patriotic Ghanaians ought to also commend the #OccupyGhana movement - for deciding to sue the Auditor General of Ghana in the law courts for what amounts to gross dereliction of duty: in failing to detect and prevent the theft of tens of millions of Ghana cedis on a regular basis from the coffers of the NSS.
Let us halt corruption in Ghana before it destroys our nation. A word to the wise...
Monday, 13 October 2014
President Mahama Must Caution His Close Friends & Family Members
President Mahama's closest friends and favourites amongst his extended family clan have a moral obligation not to engage in any activities that will cause him embarrassment. And the president has a duty to warn all his close friends and family members that if they "mess up", they must not expect Ghana's president to come to their rescue. That is not what he was elected into office for.
On that basis, Ms. Victoria Hamah must be strongly condemned for bringing President Mahama's name into disrepute - for allegedly saying openly in the presence of others (gathered around a senior police officer who had apparently invited her boyfriend for questioning in a gold deal over which a dispute had arisen) that she was going to call President Mahama. Why involve Ghana's President in such a shabby affair?
The idea that a young and inexperienced politician, who was sacked from her position as a deputy minister for communications - when a secret tape-recording of a phone conversation in which she intimated that her goal was to amass a fortune of at least a million dollars, was made public - is now involved with individuals engaged in a questionable gold deal, and had had the temerity to say publicly at a police station to which her boyfriend, involved in the said gold deal, had been invited, that she was going to call the president of Ghana, is intolerable.
With respect, it is time this empty-headed and vain woman was read the riot act by the presidency - before her foolishness ends up bringing President Mahama's presidency crashing down unexpectedly, in a fall from grace, from which it will never be able to recover.
Yes, for all we know, it is entirely possible (as some would say in mitigation for her) that openly claiming that she was going to call President Mahama was merely a foolish ploy to intimidate officers of the Dansoman District Police Command - thought up on the spur of the moment by an arrogant and malleable character whom, alas, it would appear is not blessed with much wisdom.
However, whichever way one looks at the latest scandal that Victoria Hamah is involved in, the very fact that she was so brazen as to mention the president's name openly in public, and in the circumstances in which her boyfriend found himself (having apparently been invited to a police station where a complaint had been lodged against him: that he had sold 6lbs of gold - reportedly worth as much as some U.S.$260,000 - in the U.S. and failed to give the proceeds to its owner), should be of grave concern to the presidency.
Who is to know that her greed for money will not end up leading her into the arms of the criminal syndicates involved in illegal gold mining and its handmaiden illegal logging? How are we to know that the unfathomable greed that drives her will not lead to her being used by super-wealthy criminals who evade taxes, sell gold illegally and launder money?
One's prayer, is that perhaps some good can come out of this pure nonsense on bamboo stilts: If indeed she did also say that she would call the Inspector General of Police, as she is alleged to have threatened, then let all the men and women of the Ghana Police Service regard her arrogance and presumption (that she could get the top brass of the police to do her bidding), as a watershed moment - when they finally resolved to be like their counterparts in the police forces of the U.K., for whom the law is no respector of persons, and is consequently strictly enforced: no matter how high up in society those who fall foul of the law might be.
The police in Ghana must show the world that they are proud professionals who now refuse to become the hirelings of our ruling elites. They must show by their deeds that they are strict enforcers of the laws of Ghana - a constitutional democracy in which all are equal before the law: and in which all law-breakers, be they from the top strata of society, or from the base-of-the-pyramid demographic, are treated exactly the same.
Above all, the time has come for some plain speaking from President Mahama to his closest friends and blood relations. Enough is enough.
He must warn each one of them that if they "mess up" and abuse their relationship with him, they must not expect to be rescued by him, when they get into trouble: be it over GYEEDA; Subah; SADA; judgement debt fraud; state institutions paying huge sums upfront as rent advance to private landlords in return for kickbacks; paying millions to ghost-workers and sharing that cash monthly; etc.; etc. - for in the Ghana of today, no one, including even he the President, is above the law.
He must never forget that it is him that history will judge - not his closest friends and members of his family clan, who would have sunk into oblivion by then, and been long forgotten: which is why he must not allow them to "mess up" his legacy. A word to the wise...
On that basis, Ms. Victoria Hamah must be strongly condemned for bringing President Mahama's name into disrepute - for allegedly saying openly in the presence of others (gathered around a senior police officer who had apparently invited her boyfriend for questioning in a gold deal over which a dispute had arisen) that she was going to call President Mahama. Why involve Ghana's President in such a shabby affair?
The idea that a young and inexperienced politician, who was sacked from her position as a deputy minister for communications - when a secret tape-recording of a phone conversation in which she intimated that her goal was to amass a fortune of at least a million dollars, was made public - is now involved with individuals engaged in a questionable gold deal, and had had the temerity to say publicly at a police station to which her boyfriend, involved in the said gold deal, had been invited, that she was going to call the president of Ghana, is intolerable.
With respect, it is time this empty-headed and vain woman was read the riot act by the presidency - before her foolishness ends up bringing President Mahama's presidency crashing down unexpectedly, in a fall from grace, from which it will never be able to recover.
Yes, for all we know, it is entirely possible (as some would say in mitigation for her) that openly claiming that she was going to call President Mahama was merely a foolish ploy to intimidate officers of the Dansoman District Police Command - thought up on the spur of the moment by an arrogant and malleable character whom, alas, it would appear is not blessed with much wisdom.
However, whichever way one looks at the latest scandal that Victoria Hamah is involved in, the very fact that she was so brazen as to mention the president's name openly in public, and in the circumstances in which her boyfriend found himself (having apparently been invited to a police station where a complaint had been lodged against him: that he had sold 6lbs of gold - reportedly worth as much as some U.S.$260,000 - in the U.S. and failed to give the proceeds to its owner), should be of grave concern to the presidency.
Who is to know that her greed for money will not end up leading her into the arms of the criminal syndicates involved in illegal gold mining and its handmaiden illegal logging? How are we to know that the unfathomable greed that drives her will not lead to her being used by super-wealthy criminals who evade taxes, sell gold illegally and launder money?
One's prayer, is that perhaps some good can come out of this pure nonsense on bamboo stilts: If indeed she did also say that she would call the Inspector General of Police, as she is alleged to have threatened, then let all the men and women of the Ghana Police Service regard her arrogance and presumption (that she could get the top brass of the police to do her bidding), as a watershed moment - when they finally resolved to be like their counterparts in the police forces of the U.K., for whom the law is no respector of persons, and is consequently strictly enforced: no matter how high up in society those who fall foul of the law might be.
The police in Ghana must show the world that they are proud professionals who now refuse to become the hirelings of our ruling elites. They must show by their deeds that they are strict enforcers of the laws of Ghana - a constitutional democracy in which all are equal before the law: and in which all law-breakers, be they from the top strata of society, or from the base-of-the-pyramid demographic, are treated exactly the same.
Above all, the time has come for some plain speaking from President Mahama to his closest friends and blood relations. Enough is enough.
He must warn each one of them that if they "mess up" and abuse their relationship with him, they must not expect to be rescued by him, when they get into trouble: be it over GYEEDA; Subah; SADA; judgement debt fraud; state institutions paying huge sums upfront as rent advance to private landlords in return for kickbacks; paying millions to ghost-workers and sharing that cash monthly; etc.; etc. - for in the Ghana of today, no one, including even he the President, is above the law.
He must never forget that it is him that history will judge - not his closest friends and members of his family clan, who would have sunk into oblivion by then, and been long forgotten: which is why he must not allow them to "mess up" his legacy. A word to the wise...
Saturday, 11 October 2014
We Must Find A Creative Way To Finance Imports With Ghana Cedis - Through Diasporans
There is a general consensus in the country at large that we must cut down on our imports, and expand our export trade, if we are to prosper as a people. Yet, in the short to medium term, cutting down our import bill will be a rather tall order.
The question then is: is there a creative way to pay for some of the goods that importers bring into the country - without draining our hard currency reserves?
Could we, for example, get Diasporans willing to accept payment in Ghana cedis for goods purchased from them overseas by local importers, to fashion the architecture for such deals with stakeholders such as the ministry of trade and industry, the various trade associations and the banks?
Perhaps if we looked to the diaspora, importers might be able to pay for some of the goods they import into the country with Ghana cedis - and ease the pressure created by the strong demand for foreign currency on the local forex markets.
Banks in Ghana could play a crucial role in enabling Ghanaians in the diaspora to pay for some of Ghana's imports - by setting up escrow accounts into which importers pay Diasporans for goods they purchase from them (quoted purchase prices will probably always be on a CIF basis, incidentally).
I will use the business model of a wealthy and brilliant Ghanaian-American couple resident in the U.S. to illustrate the architecture of such deals.
I do know for a fact that the couple would be happy to accept to have the dollar equivalent in local currency, paid into their local bank accounts in Ghana, by Ghanaian importers who purchase some of the different types of goods they stock - such as brand new caterpillar spare parts of the "pre-electronic-age" type - directly from their U.S. warehouse.
In a hypothetical example of a deal, the various spare parts dealers associations at Abbosey Okai could arrange with business-friendly banks like the GN Bank, Unibank, UT Bank, Ecobank and Cal Bank, to set up escrow accounts into which they pay the Ghana cedi equivalent, of the quoted dollar CIF price, for the goods they order from the said Ghanaian-American couple's U.S. warehouse.
(Where necessary - even when the importers' cash has been secured in the escrow account - the Diasporans could still ask importers to get the participating banks to issue either a bank draft or an irrevocable letter of credit in their favour, on the importers' behalf, as additional security.)
Naturally, the importers would have to pay all import duties and surcharges themselves at the ports, and take delivery of the goods themselves. The couple stock a variety of American-made products - all of the highest quality: their specialty being the sale of brand new surplus military-grade products.
Alas, having once been burnt badly by offering credit to buyers from Ghana, the couple no longer offer credit. Eventually, they plan to build their own warehouses in Accra, Kumasi and Takoradi, and stock them with some of the goods they stock in their U.S. warehouse.
Stakeholders could fine-tune the business model and perfect it so that all parties involved can benefit from such deals: the Diasporans get paid promptly, and the importers get to pay in Ghana cedis for the imported goods they order from Diasporans.
I am pretty sure that there are many Ghanaians who could also come up with variations of this particular business model, which enables importers to pay for goods imported from Diasporans in Ghana cedis.
One hopes that the new trade and industry minister, the dynamic Dr. Ekow Spio Garbrah, will take a look at the idea, and make it work for Mother Ghana. It is a simple and creative way to pay Ghana cedis for imported goods purchased from Diasporans - many of whom would welcome the opportunity to contribute positively to the growth of Ghana's GDP. A word to the wise...
The question then is: is there a creative way to pay for some of the goods that importers bring into the country - without draining our hard currency reserves?
Could we, for example, get Diasporans willing to accept payment in Ghana cedis for goods purchased from them overseas by local importers, to fashion the architecture for such deals with stakeholders such as the ministry of trade and industry, the various trade associations and the banks?
Perhaps if we looked to the diaspora, importers might be able to pay for some of the goods they import into the country with Ghana cedis - and ease the pressure created by the strong demand for foreign currency on the local forex markets.
Banks in Ghana could play a crucial role in enabling Ghanaians in the diaspora to pay for some of Ghana's imports - by setting up escrow accounts into which importers pay Diasporans for goods they purchase from them (quoted purchase prices will probably always be on a CIF basis, incidentally).
I will use the business model of a wealthy and brilliant Ghanaian-American couple resident in the U.S. to illustrate the architecture of such deals.
I do know for a fact that the couple would be happy to accept to have the dollar equivalent in local currency, paid into their local bank accounts in Ghana, by Ghanaian importers who purchase some of the different types of goods they stock - such as brand new caterpillar spare parts of the "pre-electronic-age" type - directly from their U.S. warehouse.
In a hypothetical example of a deal, the various spare parts dealers associations at Abbosey Okai could arrange with business-friendly banks like the GN Bank, Unibank, UT Bank, Ecobank and Cal Bank, to set up escrow accounts into which they pay the Ghana cedi equivalent, of the quoted dollar CIF price, for the goods they order from the said Ghanaian-American couple's U.S. warehouse.
(Where necessary - even when the importers' cash has been secured in the escrow account - the Diasporans could still ask importers to get the participating banks to issue either a bank draft or an irrevocable letter of credit in their favour, on the importers' behalf, as additional security.)
Naturally, the importers would have to pay all import duties and surcharges themselves at the ports, and take delivery of the goods themselves. The couple stock a variety of American-made products - all of the highest quality: their specialty being the sale of brand new surplus military-grade products.
Alas, having once been burnt badly by offering credit to buyers from Ghana, the couple no longer offer credit. Eventually, they plan to build their own warehouses in Accra, Kumasi and Takoradi, and stock them with some of the goods they stock in their U.S. warehouse.
Stakeholders could fine-tune the business model and perfect it so that all parties involved can benefit from such deals: the Diasporans get paid promptly, and the importers get to pay in Ghana cedis for the imported goods they order from Diasporans.
I am pretty sure that there are many Ghanaians who could also come up with variations of this particular business model, which enables importers to pay for goods imported from Diasporans in Ghana cedis.
One hopes that the new trade and industry minister, the dynamic Dr. Ekow Spio Garbrah, will take a look at the idea, and make it work for Mother Ghana. It is a simple and creative way to pay Ghana cedis for imported goods purchased from Diasporans - many of whom would welcome the opportunity to contribute positively to the growth of Ghana's GDP. A word to the wise...
Friday, 10 October 2014
Should The International Community Build A World-Class Infectious Diseases Hospital In Ghana?
There have been media reports of a number of job resignations and outright refusals to treat anymore Ebola patients amongst the medical staff at Madrid's Carlos111 hospital - where nursing assistant, Ms. Teresa Romeros Ramos, who contracted the Ebola fever virus whiles caring for a Spanish priest repatriated to Spain from Sierra Leone, where he contracted Ebola fever, is herself recieving treatment: the first such transmission in Europe.
Considering the deadly nature of the Ebola fever virus, and the high toll it has taken in mortality rates amongst healthcare professionals in the countries at the centre of the outbreak of the virus in west Africa, it is not surprising that there appears to be a reluctance amongst healthcare professionals working at Madrid's Carlos 111 hospital to treat anymore Ebola patients.
Apparently they are doubtful that the hospital is sufficiently equipped to handle the treatment of Ebola patients safely. There have been similar misgivings expressed by some healthcare professionals in Ghana too.
However, dangerous viruses are not respectors of national boundaries: we could be dealing with an outbreak of Ebola fever tomorrow, for example. Alas, conditions here are perfect for it to spread quickly and widely. We are only lucky to have been spared thus far.
For that reason , our nation's leaders must think the unthinkable - and make a proposal to the international community: as a long-term solution to help prevent future pandemics of dangerous viral infections.
Perhaps Ghana's leaders ought to suggest to the international community that in an interconnected world, it would be wise for the wealthy nations of the world to consider contributing funds for the World Health Organisation (WHO), to build the world's best-equipped infectious diseases hospital in Ghana.
Were such a hospital available today, for example, in addition to treating local people, it could be made available for the treatment of the healthcare professionals from around the world who have volunteered to come to west Africa, to help halt the spread of the Ebola fever to the other nations in west Africa not affected by the current outbreak, who contract Ebola themselves.
That would prevent the spreading of deadly hemorrhagic fever infections to other continents that we have seen occurring in the current west African Ebola fever outbreak.
Mr. Thomas Eric Duncan, the Liberian who died on Wednesday in Texas, and put some of those he came into contact with at risk, was also in Ghana for a wedding in 2011.
Who is to say that someone else from Liberia might not attend a similar event in Ghana next week - and fall ill here a few days after that wedding? In theory, we are all at risk from viruses brought from elsewhere, to wherever in the world we live.
If funds are provided for the suggested WHO infectious diseases hospital's construction, it could become a centre of excellence for the treatment of contagious diseases, where healthcare professionals from across Africa could also be trained to deal with deadly viruses that cause infectious diseases such as Ebola, Marburg and Lassa fevers. It must have a crematorium attached to it too.
It should also be designed to have a capacity for a thousand beds and have accommodation for the healthcare professionals who will work there. It should provide individual wards for the care of all its patients safely - meaning staff should be able to deal with the disposal of personal protection clothing for healthcare professionals, and all the patients' bedding, clothing, cutlery, crockery, bodily fluids and solids, safely.
Offering land to the international community for the construction of such a specialist infectious diseases hospital, could be Ghana's contribution to the fight against the outbreak of dangerous infectious diseases in Africa specifically, and the rest of the world generally. In my humble opinion, for the common good of all humankind, the international community ought to build a world-class infectious diseases hospital in Ghana. A word to the wise...
Monday, 6 October 2014
Akyem Tumfa's Cocoa Farmers Must Elicit WACAM's Help To Fight Step Mining Company's Impunity
The use of personnel from the security agencies, to pave the way for Step Mining Company to mine gold on farmlands belonging to cocoa farmers in Akyem Tumfa, who are opposed to their farms being taken over by the company, is most unfortunate.
It illustrates perfectly, how powerful and influential individuals in our country - who don't care one jot about the effect of their actions on their fellow human beings and the natural environment - manipulate the system in furtherance of their personal wealth-creation agenda, at the expense of ordinary people.
According to media reports, the Hon. Comfort Nyarko, the Assembly member for Akyem Tumfa - which is in the Atewa District of Akyem Abuakwa in the Eastern Region - has stated categorically that technically the company lost the concession years ago, and that Step Mining Company is also in breach of Section 13, sub-section 3b of Act 703.
The question then is: why is the government minister responsible for the Eastern Region so eager to coerce Akyem Tumfa's cocoa farmers into allowing their cocoa farms to be destroyed by a gold mining company that is said to be in breach of a section of Act 703? Whose interests is he serving - and why?
Are some of our leaders so shortsighted that they are willing to see the destruction of cocoa farms, which produce cocoa beans in sustainable fashion - and the export of which remains the lifeblood of our country's economy - by carpetbaggers mining gold illegally?
And as we all know, illegal logging is the handmaiden of illegal gold mining. It funds the operations of illegal gold miners: so in effect Mother Nature then becomes a multiple-rape victim.
The plight of Akyem Tumfa's cocoa farmers would never have arisen, if district chief executives (DCE) in Ghana were elected by local people - instead of being appointed by the president as is presently the case.
No political party's candidate for the position of DCE, having been elected into office, would have allowed the outrage now going on in Akyem Tumfa to occur during his or her tenure: lest he or she loses the subsequent election, for allowing grassroots people unwilling to allow their cocoa farms to be destroyed by a perfidious gold mining company, to be brutalised by soldiers and police officers.
From my personal experience of standing up to Solar Mining Company, which in effect reversed into a then bankrupt Kibi Goldfields as a legal maneuver to obtain legal cover for its illegal gold mining activities at Akyem Juaso, Saamang and Osino at a point in time, my humble advice to the cocoa farmers of Akyem Tumfa, is to contact WACAM, the NGO that fights against gold mining companies that abuse the rights of ordinary people - and ask it to partner the Centre for Public Interest Law (CPIL), to sue Step Mining Company, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Minerals Commission, on their behalf, in the law courts.
Going to court is the only way that Akyem Tumfa's cocoa farmers, who are opposed to Step Mining Company destroying their farmland in order to mine gold on it, can halt the chicanery of the unholy alliance of politicians and public officials who are working on behalf of the powerful and influential individuals, whose quest for gold is what drives the illegal activities of companies like Step Mining Company in Akyem Abuakwa.
Clearly, President Mahama's fight against illegal gold mining is being sabotaged by influential individuals, in his own regime - and it is resulting in the poisoning of soils and water bodies with heavy metals, and the destruction of ecosystems across a vast swathe of the Ghanaian countryside: at a time when global climate change is negatively impacting Africa.
The presidency would be wise to ask the national security apparatus to investigate all the claims made by the Assembly member of Akyem Tumfa, the Hon. Comfort Nyarko.
I would be surprised, for example, if it turned out that Step Mining has actually paid a reclamation bond upfront as required by law. And would the company and its promoters stand up to scrutiny by the Ghana Revenue Authority, one wonders? Ditto the Economic and Organised Crime Office? Food for thought for the presidency.
If the answer to any of the questions above is no, then one wonders how they were able to obtain permits from relevant regulatory bodies, to mine gold in Akyem Tumfa in the first place.
The time has come to smoke out all the influential individuals who manipulate the system to enable illegal gold mining to be carried out in Akyem Abuakwa and elsewhere in Ghana. The cocoa farmers of Akyem Tumfa would be wise to elicit the help of WACAM - which will engage the Centre for Public Interest Law on their behalf to sue Step Mining Company, the EPA and the Minerals Commission in the law courts. A word to the wise...
It illustrates perfectly, how powerful and influential individuals in our country - who don't care one jot about the effect of their actions on their fellow human beings and the natural environment - manipulate the system in furtherance of their personal wealth-creation agenda, at the expense of ordinary people.
According to media reports, the Hon. Comfort Nyarko, the Assembly member for Akyem Tumfa - which is in the Atewa District of Akyem Abuakwa in the Eastern Region - has stated categorically that technically the company lost the concession years ago, and that Step Mining Company is also in breach of Section 13, sub-section 3b of Act 703.
The question then is: why is the government minister responsible for the Eastern Region so eager to coerce Akyem Tumfa's cocoa farmers into allowing their cocoa farms to be destroyed by a gold mining company that is said to be in breach of a section of Act 703? Whose interests is he serving - and why?
Are some of our leaders so shortsighted that they are willing to see the destruction of cocoa farms, which produce cocoa beans in sustainable fashion - and the export of which remains the lifeblood of our country's economy - by carpetbaggers mining gold illegally?
And as we all know, illegal logging is the handmaiden of illegal gold mining. It funds the operations of illegal gold miners: so in effect Mother Nature then becomes a multiple-rape victim.
The plight of Akyem Tumfa's cocoa farmers would never have arisen, if district chief executives (DCE) in Ghana were elected by local people - instead of being appointed by the president as is presently the case.
No political party's candidate for the position of DCE, having been elected into office, would have allowed the outrage now going on in Akyem Tumfa to occur during his or her tenure: lest he or she loses the subsequent election, for allowing grassroots people unwilling to allow their cocoa farms to be destroyed by a perfidious gold mining company, to be brutalised by soldiers and police officers.
From my personal experience of standing up to Solar Mining Company, which in effect reversed into a then bankrupt Kibi Goldfields as a legal maneuver to obtain legal cover for its illegal gold mining activities at Akyem Juaso, Saamang and Osino at a point in time, my humble advice to the cocoa farmers of Akyem Tumfa, is to contact WACAM, the NGO that fights against gold mining companies that abuse the rights of ordinary people - and ask it to partner the Centre for Public Interest Law (CPIL), to sue Step Mining Company, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Minerals Commission, on their behalf, in the law courts.
Going to court is the only way that Akyem Tumfa's cocoa farmers, who are opposed to Step Mining Company destroying their farmland in order to mine gold on it, can halt the chicanery of the unholy alliance of politicians and public officials who are working on behalf of the powerful and influential individuals, whose quest for gold is what drives the illegal activities of companies like Step Mining Company in Akyem Abuakwa.
Clearly, President Mahama's fight against illegal gold mining is being sabotaged by influential individuals, in his own regime - and it is resulting in the poisoning of soils and water bodies with heavy metals, and the destruction of ecosystems across a vast swathe of the Ghanaian countryside: at a time when global climate change is negatively impacting Africa.
The presidency would be wise to ask the national security apparatus to investigate all the claims made by the Assembly member of Akyem Tumfa, the Hon. Comfort Nyarko.
I would be surprised, for example, if it turned out that Step Mining has actually paid a reclamation bond upfront as required by law. And would the company and its promoters stand up to scrutiny by the Ghana Revenue Authority, one wonders? Ditto the Economic and Organised Crime Office? Food for thought for the presidency.
If the answer to any of the questions above is no, then one wonders how they were able to obtain permits from relevant regulatory bodies, to mine gold in Akyem Tumfa in the first place.
The time has come to smoke out all the influential individuals who manipulate the system to enable illegal gold mining to be carried out in Akyem Abuakwa and elsewhere in Ghana. The cocoa farmers of Akyem Tumfa would be wise to elicit the help of WACAM - which will engage the Centre for Public Interest Law on their behalf to sue Step Mining Company, the EPA and the Minerals Commission in the law courts. A word to the wise...
Saturday, 4 October 2014
Ghana's Moslems Must Spare A Thought For Victims Of Religious Extremists - And Condemn Terrorism
As the world's mostly-peaceful 1.6 billion Moslems celebrate Eid al-Adha, the barbarism of extremist Islamic groups such as the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), Al-Shabab and Boko Haram ought to be condemned by peace-loving individuals worldwide.
ISIL's brutal murder of innocent civilians captured in the areas where it has been involved in fighting is unspeakable, cowardly and unforgivable.
Their murder of innocents is sinful and abominable - and will earn them a place in hell as sure as day follows night.
In sharp contrast to the bloodthirsty Islamic extremists of the world, Ghana's Moslems have always chosen the path of peace - and long may it remain so, insha Allah.
They must be commended for the way they have coexisted peacefully with Ghanaians of other faiths over the decades. They are a shining example of religious tolerance to the world at large.
The whole of humankind must unite to fight religious extremists who murder innocents. They represent a clear and present danger to all of humanity. Their horrific crimes against humanity cannot be justified under any circumstances.
As they celebrate Eid al-Adha today, one hopes that Moslems in Ghana will spare a thought for the victims of religious extremists around the globe - and condemn their brutish co-religionists engaged in terrorism, who murder innocent people, in the strongest possible terms.
ISIL's brutal murder of innocent civilians captured in the areas where it has been involved in fighting is unspeakable, cowardly and unforgivable.
Their murder of innocents is sinful and abominable - and will earn them a place in hell as sure as day follows night.
In sharp contrast to the bloodthirsty Islamic extremists of the world, Ghana's Moslems have always chosen the path of peace - and long may it remain so, insha Allah.
They must be commended for the way they have coexisted peacefully with Ghanaians of other faiths over the decades. They are a shining example of religious tolerance to the world at large.
The whole of humankind must unite to fight religious extremists who murder innocents. They represent a clear and present danger to all of humanity. Their horrific crimes against humanity cannot be justified under any circumstances.
As they celebrate Eid al-Adha today, one hopes that Moslems in Ghana will spare a thought for the victims of religious extremists around the globe - and condemn their brutish co-religionists engaged in terrorism, who murder innocent people, in the strongest possible terms.
Wednesday, 1 October 2014
A Useful Tip For The GNPC
Recently, we were told that the Ghana National Petroleum Company (GNPC) needed about some US$50 millions or thereabouts to increase production at the Saltpond oil field.
Perhaps the management of the GNPC could take advantage of the new technique that has been developed by the Heriot-Watt University's centre
for enhanced oil recovery.
In the hope that a public-spirited person reading it will pass the information on to those running the GNPC, I am sharing an article culled from the BBC News website with readers.
One hopes the GNPC will find the article useful - and invite Heriot-Watt University's Professor Mehran Sohrabi and his team to work with them to increase the lifespan of the Saltpond oil field.
Please read on:
"Technology boost for Scotland's oil reserves in North Sea
Researchers say gas and water technologies could add decades to the life span of North Sea oil reserves
New
gas and water technologies could add decades to the lifespan of oil
reserves in the North Sea, according to Edinburgh researchers.
A Heriot-Watt University team said they had made a
breakthrough in developing clean and cheap methods to maximise
extraction from existing fields.The university has been working on a technique known as low-salinity water injection.
The team has been researching which fields would benefit most from it.
Researchers have also been developing gas injection technologies for use in reservoirs that are already flooded with water.
Professor Mehran Sohrabi, director of the university's centre for enhanced oil recovery, believes new technologies could be a game changer for the industry and has called for more investment to reverse the decline in North Sea production.
'Too expensive' He said: "At least half of the original oil still remains in the North Sea reservoirs but there are great challenges in extracting it using enhanced oil recovery (EOR) techniques.
"These include limited platform space and large well spacing, making extraction too expensive to pursue.
"Following years of research at the university, we now believe we can overcome these challenges."
Low-salinity water injection works by reducing the salt levels in sea water that is already injected into reservoirs.
Mr Sohrabi said: "It has the potential to make a huge impact on the current output of the North Sea's oil production.
"We have developed a robust method to screen oil reservoirs to identify the ones that would respond positively to low salinity water injection.
"This allows us to estimate the size of incremental oil recovery, which is vital for economic calculations of enhanced oil recovery projects."
End of culled article from the BBC News website.
Sunday, 28 September 2014
The NDC & NPP Must Stop Kowtowing To Vested Interests
Having both been in power for at least a minimum of two consecutive 4-year terms each, what conclusions, if any, can one draw from the years during which the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) and the party that formed its predecessor regime, the New Patriotic Party (NPP), have ruled Ghana?
For a start, it is obvious that the need for funds to run them, makes both parties beholden to vested interests - yet the sole purpose of vested interests in our country, as we all know, is to participate in the brutal gang-rape of Mother Ghana.
It is also a fact that buying off those who seek to protect the national interest, at any given point in time, is what enables vested interests in our country to achieve their goals - and maintain their iron-grip on our nation.
That is how come the same people who virtually crippled Intercity STC during the Kufuor-era, by foisting untested and unsuitable Chinese-made FAW buses on the company, are repeating their super-lucrative trick - this time lumbering Metro Mass Transit Limited with Chinese buses: at the outrageous profiteering-price of a staggering US$200,000 each.
The many logic-defying laws passed by Ghana's Parliament over the years - laws clearly detrimental to our country - also remain eloquent testimony to the power of vested interests in Ghana.
The sale and purchase agreement for VALCO to a non-existent joint-venture, International Aluminium Partners (IAP), during the NPP's period in office is another egregious example of the shenanigans of vested interests.
In that instance, the Norwegian company Norske Hydro and the Brazilian firm VALE, both strenously denied ever agreeing to purchase VALCO in a joint-venture. Yet vested interests somehow succeeded in having that fraudulent agreement railroaded through Parliament,
Clearly, in order to rid political parties of the baleful influence of vested interests, there is a need to lift the veil of secrecy surrounding their sources of funding.
As long as both major parties are secretive about their sources of funding, they will continue to remain vulnerable to the blandishments of the powerful few with greedy ambitions - who actively participate in the rip-off of our nation - and corruption will consequently remain endemic in Ghana.
That is why those ultimately responsible for the GYEEDA, LESDEP, SUBAH and SADA scandals appear to be beyond the reach of the laws of our country - whiles smaller fish are used as scapegoats by being tried: as a sop to public opinion and to placate critics of the government.
Let the men and women of goodwill in all the political parties in our country address this central problem of our nation's politics.
It is a problem that must be confronted if we are to rid Ghana of high-level corruption. As things stand, it does not matter whether it is the NDC or NPP that is in power: alas, corruption will continue to hold back our nation from moving forward - and living conditions for ordinary people will continue to remain harsh and unbearable.
Perhaps the question we must pose is: if, after lengthy periods in power, there has been precious little improvement in the lives of ordinary people in Ghana - particularly those from the base-of-the-pyramid demographic - what does that tell us about the ability of the NDC and NPP to resolve the problems that confront ordinary Ghanaians?
It is time ordinary people understood that if the two biggest political parties in Ghana continue to be beholden to vested interests, they will continue to pay lip service to ensuring the well-being of our nation and promoting the welfare of ordinary people - and focus instead on serving their selfish and ruthless paymasters.
It is the power exercised by vested interests, for example, that is responsible for Ghana signing the world's worst oil agreements with foreign oil companies.
The painful truth is that if we are to see an improvement in living conditions for ordinary people in Ghana, the NDC and NPP must be forced to stop kowtowing to vested interests. Failing that, perhaps Ghanaians would be wise to turn to other political parties instead, in the December 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections. A word to the wise....
For a start, it is obvious that the need for funds to run them, makes both parties beholden to vested interests - yet the sole purpose of vested interests in our country, as we all know, is to participate in the brutal gang-rape of Mother Ghana.
It is also a fact that buying off those who seek to protect the national interest, at any given point in time, is what enables vested interests in our country to achieve their goals - and maintain their iron-grip on our nation.
That is how come the same people who virtually crippled Intercity STC during the Kufuor-era, by foisting untested and unsuitable Chinese-made FAW buses on the company, are repeating their super-lucrative trick - this time lumbering Metro Mass Transit Limited with Chinese buses: at the outrageous profiteering-price of a staggering US$200,000 each.
The many logic-defying laws passed by Ghana's Parliament over the years - laws clearly detrimental to our country - also remain eloquent testimony to the power of vested interests in Ghana.
The sale and purchase agreement for VALCO to a non-existent joint-venture, International Aluminium Partners (IAP), during the NPP's period in office is another egregious example of the shenanigans of vested interests.
In that instance, the Norwegian company Norske Hydro and the Brazilian firm VALE, both strenously denied ever agreeing to purchase VALCO in a joint-venture. Yet vested interests somehow succeeded in having that fraudulent agreement railroaded through Parliament,
Clearly, in order to rid political parties of the baleful influence of vested interests, there is a need to lift the veil of secrecy surrounding their sources of funding.
As long as both major parties are secretive about their sources of funding, they will continue to remain vulnerable to the blandishments of the powerful few with greedy ambitions - who actively participate in the rip-off of our nation - and corruption will consequently remain endemic in Ghana.
That is why those ultimately responsible for the GYEEDA, LESDEP, SUBAH and SADA scandals appear to be beyond the reach of the laws of our country - whiles smaller fish are used as scapegoats by being tried: as a sop to public opinion and to placate critics of the government.
Let the men and women of goodwill in all the political parties in our country address this central problem of our nation's politics.
It is a problem that must be confronted if we are to rid Ghana of high-level corruption. As things stand, it does not matter whether it is the NDC or NPP that is in power: alas, corruption will continue to hold back our nation from moving forward - and living conditions for ordinary people will continue to remain harsh and unbearable.
Perhaps the question we must pose is: if, after lengthy periods in power, there has been precious little improvement in the lives of ordinary people in Ghana - particularly those from the base-of-the-pyramid demographic - what does that tell us about the ability of the NDC and NPP to resolve the problems that confront ordinary Ghanaians?
It is time ordinary people understood that if the two biggest political parties in Ghana continue to be beholden to vested interests, they will continue to pay lip service to ensuring the well-being of our nation and promoting the welfare of ordinary people - and focus instead on serving their selfish and ruthless paymasters.
It is the power exercised by vested interests, for example, that is responsible for Ghana signing the world's worst oil agreements with foreign oil companies.
The painful truth is that if we are to see an improvement in living conditions for ordinary people in Ghana, the NDC and NPP must be forced to stop kowtowing to vested interests. Failing that, perhaps Ghanaians would be wise to turn to other political parties instead, in the December 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections. A word to the wise....
Thursday, 25 September 2014
Ghanaian Healthcare Professionals Must Be More Compassionate Of The Poor
One hopes it will inspire healthcare professionals in Ghana - and make them more willing to help those unfortunate enough to contract the Ebola fever virus in Ghana: should it ever appear here too (God forbid).
Above all, one hopes that it will make our healthcare professionals more compassionate and considerate in the way they treat poor people.
To begin with, it is important to make the point that there is no question that many Ghanaian healthcare professionals are compassionate individuals - who remember the Hippocratic oath they've taken: and are obviously guided by it daily in their work.
However, there is a significant number of them, who alas appear to despise the poor - and treat them with obvious contempt. Refusing to see the sick and abandoning patients to die as a result of strike action over pay is an obvious example, in my view.
Years ago, I was told by one of her colleagues at the time she was doing her orientation at a public-sector healthcare facility to which she had been attached - prior to taking the pre-registration Medical and Dental Council examination for foreign doctors wanting to work in Ghana - that there was a marked difference between the kind and gentle way my German medical doctor wife, Birgit, interacted with sick poor people - and the abrupt way that some of her colleague Ghanaian healthcare professionals treated them.
Indeed, the unfortunate truth, is that it is hard not to be appalled by the stories that are recounted to one by affected individuals, and the reports one reads and hears in the Ghanaian media, about the callous attitude shown by many Ghanaian healthcare professionals, to the poor, in healthcare facilities across the country.
Alas, in my own case, I did observe that there was indeed a difference between my wife's egalitarian approach to poor people wherever she encountered them - which struck me as contrasting sharply with the shabby way that many poor people are treated in public-sector healthcare facilities, by the selfsame professionals who toady up to the wealthy, on a daily basis, when on duty in private hospitals across the country.
Ghanaian healthcare professionals need to be more compassionate of the poor - especially at a time when we are all threatened by the Ebola fever outbreak in the west African sub-region. Please read on:
"19 September 2014 Last updated at 23:05 GMT
Why I'll risk my life for Ebola patients
Hundreds
of foreign aid workers are in West Africa treating people with Ebola.
One of them is Cokie van der Velde who has just flown from the UK to
Liberia. She explains why she has left the safety of her home to face
the deadly virus.
I was first in Liberia five weeks ago and I believe the situation is now much worse. Back then, our treatment centres had already run out of room and we were starting to put people in corridors.
In the centre, people groan and cry out - the smell of blood, diarrhoea and vomit is awful - unfortunately there is also a very pervading smell of dead bodies.
I can only leave it to your imagination to understand what a pile of bodies smells like after a week in very hot, moist surroundings - it makes you feel sick quite a lot of the time.
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote
Nobody else has been near them for days. They must feel very lonely and very frightened”
I am responsible for infection
control which means that my first job is to ensure the safety of the
people I work with and of myself. We have to wear our scrubs, then two
or three pairs of gloves, a completely waterproof suit and a head
covering, a mask, goggles and a big apron over the top.
It's incredibly hot and humid - when you undress back to the scrubs afterwards it looks like someone has just poured a bucket of water over you.
I try to go round the patients and help where I can and give them some water. I'll change and wash patients and just try and give some physical contact to each person because nobody else will touch them, nobody else has been near them for days. They must feel very lonely and very frightened.
I don't know how much comfort I am bringing to people when I'm dressed in a mask and goggles and completely covered from head to foot. If we have children at the treatment centre, which we quite often do, I'll try to bring them some toys and have a little game with them if I can.
Cokie van der Velde also helped Ebola patients in Guinea earlier this year
Depending on how many people have died, I'll then start the very unpleasant job of moving the bodies. We put people in body bags, we write the names on the body bags and we move them to the morgue.
If the relatives want to come and see the body and say goodbye, we set up a viewing and I try to make that as pleasant as I can - if that's at all possible. I'll put flowers round the body bag and if it's a child I'll put some toys around them. I'll also put the toys in the body bag with them when we seal it up.
You can't let the relatives touch the body - they are just allowed to view it and then we seal it up forever. It's a very sad moment.
I do feel fear, I can't deny that.
Continue reading the main story
Find out more
Cokie van der Velde spoke to World Update and The Why Factor on the BBC World Service
Last time I was in Liberia,
sometimes I'd think, "I feel a bit feverish", or I'd wake up during the
night and take my temperature. If I had a slight sore throat - one of
the first signs of Ebola - I'd start to worry I had the virus.
There is always an element of risk when I work for MSF - I could be caught in crossfire, I could always pick up a nasty disease and there's the small chance of kidnap. And normally I would put that risk at about one in 1,000. So it's not that high. But I must admit, when I sat down and thought about it, I would say the risk for me now is about one in 10.
I've made sure that my will and my house and everything are in order so that if for some reason I don't come back at least it will be easy for my relatives to carry on. I have had my children, I've had my grandchildren and of course I still want to be part of their lives but it's not like I'm leaving small children behind. I think it's ok for me to go and risk my life and my family understands.
I've been doing this type of work for 12 years and they are used to the fact that I go away but this time it is more concerning for them.
One of the reasons I enjoy working for MSF is the challenge. Before I started working for them, one of my passions was rock climbing. So it is probably something in my personality that makes me accept these challenges.
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote
It's made me think about my own death and what will happen when I die”
I go partly because of my belief
that there should be social justice in the world - that there should be
some sort of equality. The people I'm helping are part of the human
race, part of humanity - in that respect, all people for me are the
same. I feel I have as much obligation to help a stranger as I do to
help someone I know.
That last time I was in Liberia I must have moved hundreds of bodies but only three people survived during the month that I was there. I don't think you can see that many bodies without viewing death in a different way.
I try to always make sure that the team I'm working with stops for a moment to say goodbye to the person before we put them in the body bag. We still try to keep a reverence for the dead. Even though I'm not religious, I hope I can bring some sort of spirituality to that moment and some respect to the grieving of the relatives.
Putting all these bodies into body bags, I sometimes can't help imagining my own body being put into one - I especially think about that in the middle of the night. It's made me think about my own death and what will happen when I die. But when you see so much death, you accept that this is really just part of life - that we live and die.
That doesn't cheapen people's lives but I think it brings home to me the reality of death, whereas in our society, or at least in my life, death is sort of ignored. It's something that happens but you keep it in the back of your mind. Now it's very much in the front of my mind and I accept that it will eventually happen, sooner or later.
I do enjoy my job, I don't think you could do what I do if you didn't enjoy your work. I can't say I particularly enjoy working with dead bodies but there's a lot of camaraderie - there's a satisfaction when you do get it right and eventually we will get this epidemic under control.
When that happens there will be great elation and the satisfaction of knowing I did a job that maybe not everyone could have done and that I played a small part in helping to overcome this.
End of culled article from the BBC News website.
Monday, 22 September 2014
What Nkrumah's Detractors Fail To Recognise
On Founder's Day yesterday (21/9/2014), it was to be expected that the achievements of Ghana's first prime minister and first president, Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, whose birthday we were celebrating, would be denigrated by his detractors.
It seems to escape the Professor Mike Ocquayes in our midst that almost alone amongst the politicians in the vanguard of the movement of those who wanted the British colonial regime to transfer power to the indigenous people of the Gold Coast colony, Nkrumah wanted the new post-independence polity to be a unitary state - in which there would be universal adult suffrage and the nation's leaders would be elected by ordinary people.
Almost to a man, Nkrumah's political opponents wanted the British to grant independence to an entity that would be a federal state - one made up of pre-colonial tribal entities and in which the vote would be restricted to property owners and salaried workers only (the so-called 'property-owning democracy').
Naturally, the bulk of those who qualified for the vote in that federation of tribal entities would be the so-called 'intelligenstia', comprised mainly of members of the professional classes - who could mostly be relied on to keep the descendants of the pre-colonial ruling elites in power permanently: which was the whole idea for an elite that for the most part despised ordinary people.
So although it is true that a number of politicians fought for Ghana's independence - a historical fact that Nkrumah acknowledged: listing some of their names in his autobiography, and mentioning the names of others in some of his speeches on the subject - the unitary state that became Ghana after independence was the manisfestation of the successor-state to the Gold Coast colony that Nkrumah had envisioned during the fight for independence.
Nkrumah also virtually stood alone in clearly understanding that by definition decolonisation could never be an amicable process in which a benevolent colonial power willingly handed over a resource-rich colony to the hitherto colonised people whose destiny it once controlled to exploit its resources for their own benefit. Nkrumah was clear in his mind that in that sense no colonial power could share the same interests as those of the people it colonised: And that ultimately it could not be well-disposed towards the colonised people either.
Nkrumah knew that for that reason independence had to be snatched from the hands of the colonial power. Most of his political opponents on the other hand naively thought the British colonial power was well-disposed towards them and could be relied on to hand over power to them amicably - and were thereforge willing to accept that in the final analysis the transfer of power would be on Britain's terms.
It was a grave error of judgement and a strategic mistake. Alas, it is that selfsame naivety amongst the present crop of the political progeny of Nkrumah's political opponents of yesteryear, which is responsible for the neocolonialism that enables our resources to be pillaged by foreign commercial interests (covered by opaque legal agreements sanctioned by our self-seeking ruling elites that are detrimental to our nation).
Perhaps it might come as a surprise to many younger generation Ghanaians to discover that some of Nkrumah's opponents actually travelled all the way to London to plead for independence to be delayed - because in their view we were not ready for it. Incredible, but true.
(Incidentally, after Ghana gained its independence, they also tried to stop U.S. government and multilateral institutional funding for the Akosombo hydropower project. Amazing. But I digress.)
And when the so-called 'Big Six' were arrested, five of them promptly denounced the sixth, Nkrumah, to the colonial authorities - accusing him of being a communist agent. Whiles they were freed, Nkrumah was kept incarcerated.
Nkrumah was a genuine nationalist hero who towered above his contemporaries. That is why he is the only politician of his generation to be in the Pantheon of twentieth century greats. With respect, the verdict of history is not obtained by revisionism - and neither is it secured by dissimulation.
Nkrumah had his faults. He was not perfect. But he genuinely cared about ordinary people and sought their welfare always. And he acted to protect the national interest at all material times. For example, he would never have allowed those rip-off oil agreements with foreign oil companies, which we are now lumbered with, as a result of today's high-level corruption - something that Nkrumah would never have tolerated in such an important sector of the national economy.
The failure of Nkrumah's detractors to recognise the fact that Nkrumah and his opponents sought different successor-states to the Gold Coast colony, during the fight for independence, is the main reason why they are against him being referred to as Ghana's founder. To the extent that Nkrumah fought for a unitary republic, whiles his opponents sought a federation made up of pre-colonial tribal entities, he is definitely the founder of Ghana.
It seems to escape the Professor Mike Ocquayes in our midst that almost alone amongst the politicians in the vanguard of the movement of those who wanted the British colonial regime to transfer power to the indigenous people of the Gold Coast colony, Nkrumah wanted the new post-independence polity to be a unitary state - in which there would be universal adult suffrage and the nation's leaders would be elected by ordinary people.
Almost to a man, Nkrumah's political opponents wanted the British to grant independence to an entity that would be a federal state - one made up of pre-colonial tribal entities and in which the vote would be restricted to property owners and salaried workers only (the so-called 'property-owning democracy').
Naturally, the bulk of those who qualified for the vote in that federation of tribal entities would be the so-called 'intelligenstia', comprised mainly of members of the professional classes - who could mostly be relied on to keep the descendants of the pre-colonial ruling elites in power permanently: which was the whole idea for an elite that for the most part despised ordinary people.
So although it is true that a number of politicians fought for Ghana's independence - a historical fact that Nkrumah acknowledged: listing some of their names in his autobiography, and mentioning the names of others in some of his speeches on the subject - the unitary state that became Ghana after independence was the manisfestation of the successor-state to the Gold Coast colony that Nkrumah had envisioned during the fight for independence.
Nkrumah also virtually stood alone in clearly understanding that by definition decolonisation could never be an amicable process in which a benevolent colonial power willingly handed over a resource-rich colony to the hitherto colonised people whose destiny it once controlled to exploit its resources for their own benefit. Nkrumah was clear in his mind that in that sense no colonial power could share the same interests as those of the people it colonised: And that ultimately it could not be well-disposed towards the colonised people either.
Nkrumah knew that for that reason independence had to be snatched from the hands of the colonial power. Most of his political opponents on the other hand naively thought the British colonial power was well-disposed towards them and could be relied on to hand over power to them amicably - and were thereforge willing to accept that in the final analysis the transfer of power would be on Britain's terms.
It was a grave error of judgement and a strategic mistake. Alas, it is that selfsame naivety amongst the present crop of the political progeny of Nkrumah's political opponents of yesteryear, which is responsible for the neocolonialism that enables our resources to be pillaged by foreign commercial interests (covered by opaque legal agreements sanctioned by our self-seeking ruling elites that are detrimental to our nation).
Perhaps it might come as a surprise to many younger generation Ghanaians to discover that some of Nkrumah's opponents actually travelled all the way to London to plead for independence to be delayed - because in their view we were not ready for it. Incredible, but true.
(Incidentally, after Ghana gained its independence, they also tried to stop U.S. government and multilateral institutional funding for the Akosombo hydropower project. Amazing. But I digress.)
And when the so-called 'Big Six' were arrested, five of them promptly denounced the sixth, Nkrumah, to the colonial authorities - accusing him of being a communist agent. Whiles they were freed, Nkrumah was kept incarcerated.
Nkrumah was a genuine nationalist hero who towered above his contemporaries. That is why he is the only politician of his generation to be in the Pantheon of twentieth century greats. With respect, the verdict of history is not obtained by revisionism - and neither is it secured by dissimulation.
Nkrumah had his faults. He was not perfect. But he genuinely cared about ordinary people and sought their welfare always. And he acted to protect the national interest at all material times. For example, he would never have allowed those rip-off oil agreements with foreign oil companies, which we are now lumbered with, as a result of today's high-level corruption - something that Nkrumah would never have tolerated in such an important sector of the national economy.
The failure of Nkrumah's detractors to recognise the fact that Nkrumah and his opponents sought different successor-states to the Gold Coast colony, during the fight for independence, is the main reason why they are against him being referred to as Ghana's founder. To the extent that Nkrumah fought for a unitary republic, whiles his opponents sought a federation made up of pre-colonial tribal entities, he is definitely the founder of Ghana.
Thursday, 18 September 2014
Why Lauretta Vivian Lamptey Should Resign
At a time of austerity, in a nation in which such huge disparities in wealth exist, it is important that senior public officials are judicious in their use of taxpayers' money.
It is intolerable that huge sums belonging to taxpayers can be expended on the renting of office accommodation in expensive private properties and securing luxury accommodation to house senior public officials, as well as for the purchase of expensive official vehicles for senior staff - all of whom are already relatively well-paid as it is.
What that invariably does, is that there is very little cash left over, in the annual budgetary allocations of sundry public-sector organisations - sufficient to enable the core work for which they exist to be carried out effectively - once provision is made for payment of salaries of the rest of their staff.
One doubts very much that if it were their own private businesses, those in charge of the public-sector entities paying such astronomical sums in rent advance - as long as three years in certain cases and amounting to hundreds of thousands of Ghana cedis - to private landlords for office accommodation, and for rented accommodation to house senior staff, would venture to do so.
It is an egregious practise that cannot be justified under any circumstances in a cash-strapped country like ours - and it is vital that such senior public officials set a good example, by ensuring that hapless taxpayers get value for money at all material times, when it comes to the provision of accommodation and the purchase of new vehicles for official work.
All those public officials who engage in such profligate spending must be shown the door. Swiftly.
The case of the present Commissioner for Human Rights and Administrative Justice, Ms. Lauretta Vivian Lamptey, which has just come to light, following others in more or less the same vein that have also been recently unearthed, is most unfortunate.
If it is true, as some parliamentarians allege, that her capriciousness in demanding that her exact choice of sundry items be used in the refurbishment of her official residence - a project that has been ongoing for some three years apparently because of her fastidiousness - to ensure it is done to her taste, then in this particular instance she has not shown good judgement.
She failed to show the moderation required of senior public officials at a time of austerity: when so many of the ordinary Ghanaians whose taxes she apparently wants to be used to keep her in the style to which she has become accustomed, are themselves experiencing hard times.
The Commissioner for Human Rights and Administrative Justice is an important office holder whose position requires behaviour that is of a different standard from the norm - an exemplary individual so principled in every aspect of his or her behaviour and character that all can safely look up to the Commissioner, secure in the knowledge that he or she is an individual of high moral standing, who posses sterling qualities and is always just and fair.
In other words, a veritable paragon of virtue, in whose hands one's human rights will always be safeguarded.
Alas, on this occassion, Ms. Lauretta Vivian Lamptey has let herself down terribly. It would be better all round if she stepped down now. She must resign - as she is so clearly unsuited to the sensitive position she currently occupies: which requires endless tact and infinite wisdom, all of which have sadly been absent, in this unfortunate matter.
It seems to have completely escaped her that these are exceptionally hard times in which millions of ordinary people are actually suffering - and struggle to survive on a daily basis. It was their taxes she was frittering away with such abandon. Like all officials caught behaving in such unacceptable fashion, she must go. We must hold all public officials accountable when it comes to spending taxpayers' money. Her position is untenable. She should resign. A word to the wise...
It is intolerable that huge sums belonging to taxpayers can be expended on the renting of office accommodation in expensive private properties and securing luxury accommodation to house senior public officials, as well as for the purchase of expensive official vehicles for senior staff - all of whom are already relatively well-paid as it is.
What that invariably does, is that there is very little cash left over, in the annual budgetary allocations of sundry public-sector organisations - sufficient to enable the core work for which they exist to be carried out effectively - once provision is made for payment of salaries of the rest of their staff.
One doubts very much that if it were their own private businesses, those in charge of the public-sector entities paying such astronomical sums in rent advance - as long as three years in certain cases and amounting to hundreds of thousands of Ghana cedis - to private landlords for office accommodation, and for rented accommodation to house senior staff, would venture to do so.
It is an egregious practise that cannot be justified under any circumstances in a cash-strapped country like ours - and it is vital that such senior public officials set a good example, by ensuring that hapless taxpayers get value for money at all material times, when it comes to the provision of accommodation and the purchase of new vehicles for official work.
All those public officials who engage in such profligate spending must be shown the door. Swiftly.
The case of the present Commissioner for Human Rights and Administrative Justice, Ms. Lauretta Vivian Lamptey, which has just come to light, following others in more or less the same vein that have also been recently unearthed, is most unfortunate.
If it is true, as some parliamentarians allege, that her capriciousness in demanding that her exact choice of sundry items be used in the refurbishment of her official residence - a project that has been ongoing for some three years apparently because of her fastidiousness - to ensure it is done to her taste, then in this particular instance she has not shown good judgement.
She failed to show the moderation required of senior public officials at a time of austerity: when so many of the ordinary Ghanaians whose taxes she apparently wants to be used to keep her in the style to which she has become accustomed, are themselves experiencing hard times.
The Commissioner for Human Rights and Administrative Justice is an important office holder whose position requires behaviour that is of a different standard from the norm - an exemplary individual so principled in every aspect of his or her behaviour and character that all can safely look up to the Commissioner, secure in the knowledge that he or she is an individual of high moral standing, who posses sterling qualities and is always just and fair.
In other words, a veritable paragon of virtue, in whose hands one's human rights will always be safeguarded.
Alas, on this occassion, Ms. Lauretta Vivian Lamptey has let herself down terribly. It would be better all round if she stepped down now. She must resign - as she is so clearly unsuited to the sensitive position she currently occupies: which requires endless tact and infinite wisdom, all of which have sadly been absent, in this unfortunate matter.
It seems to have completely escaped her that these are exceptionally hard times in which millions of ordinary people are actually suffering - and struggle to survive on a daily basis. It was their taxes she was frittering away with such abandon. Like all officials caught behaving in such unacceptable fashion, she must go. We must hold all public officials accountable when it comes to spending taxpayers' money. Her position is untenable. She should resign. A word to the wise...
Tuesday, 16 September 2014
Substantial Help At Last For Ebola-Stricken Liberia, Guinea & Sierra Leone
My heart went out to the people of Liberia, when I saw television news reports of President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf listening attentively to Ghana's President John Dramani Mahama, who had called on her a few days ago, when he undertook a trip to Ebola-stricken Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, to confer with their leaders.
Liberia's leader looked so forlorn. Sadly, the Ebola fever virus outbreak has all but destroyed the economy of Liberia - which President Johnson Sirleaf and her people have worked so hard to rebuild, after years of dictatorship preceeded by civil war.
The same can be said of Guinea and Sierra Leone - Liberia's immediate neighbours - both of which have also been badly hit by the Ebola fever virus outbreak. It all seems so unfair and cruel. Fate has not been kind to those sister nations of ours, at all.
However, at long last, help is on the way that could make a real difference for the three nations in coping with the disaster that has befallen their people: President Barack Obama's administration is stepping in to help.
The U.S. is said to be preparing to send up to some 3,000 military personnel to Liberia - to help fight the west African Ebola fever outbreak. The Washington Post says the effort will cost about US$750 millions over 6 months.
Liberia is the hardest-hit of the three neighbouring states with the largest numbers of deaths from Ebola fever.
During what has been designated 'Operation United Assistance' U.S. military engineers will build 17 treatment centres, each with a 100-bed capacity, across Liberia. A 25-bed hospital to treat infected healthcare workers is also being prepared to be sent to Liberia.
65 United States Public Health Commissioned Officers will be deployed to manage and staff that hospital. 400,000 basic Ebola fever response kits will be supplied to households in Liberia. It will include sanitisers.
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is also bringing in 50,000 home health-care kits from Denmark, which specially trained young volunteers will distribute to people living in remote rural communities in Liberia, according to the same Washington Post news report by Lena Hunt.
The U.S. military and specialists from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will also help train up to 500 healthcare professionals a week in West Africa - in the care and treatment of those infected with the Ebola fever virus. The CDC already has as many as 100 specialists in west Africa currently.
Now that the U.S. military is stepping in to work with international organisations on the ground in west Africa, such as: Doctors Without Borders, other international NGO's like Samaritan's Purse and healthcare professionals in the overwhelmed healthcare systems of the three hardest-hit nations experiencing the Ebola fever outbreak, one's hope is that the frightening projections of as many as over some 250,000 people eventually becoming infected with the Ebola fever virus across west Africa (including Ghana), will not now materialise.
We must be thankful that at long last, the world's best-equipped military force is stepping in to help contain and halt the spread of the Ebola fever virus in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone - as well as help train as many as 500 healthcare professionals a week, from across the region, in the treatment and care of Ebola fever patients.
That really is good news - for which we must all thank the government and people of the U.S.A.
And one is also certain that the leaders and citizens of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, will also be grateful that whiles others shunned them, Ghana's President Mahama came to visit them: to show his solidarity in the face of a common danger that threatens all of west Africa, as well as to donate food items to Ebola fever patients in the three sister nations.
Thank goodness that substantial help is now finally coming to Ebola-stricken Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone: as the world wakes up to the dangers of a virus that has the potential to wipe out many if it is not contained within the next six months.
Liberia's leader looked so forlorn. Sadly, the Ebola fever virus outbreak has all but destroyed the economy of Liberia - which President Johnson Sirleaf and her people have worked so hard to rebuild, after years of dictatorship preceeded by civil war.
The same can be said of Guinea and Sierra Leone - Liberia's immediate neighbours - both of which have also been badly hit by the Ebola fever virus outbreak. It all seems so unfair and cruel. Fate has not been kind to those sister nations of ours, at all.
However, at long last, help is on the way that could make a real difference for the three nations in coping with the disaster that has befallen their people: President Barack Obama's administration is stepping in to help.
The U.S. is said to be preparing to send up to some 3,000 military personnel to Liberia - to help fight the west African Ebola fever outbreak. The Washington Post says the effort will cost about US$750 millions over 6 months.
Liberia is the hardest-hit of the three neighbouring states with the largest numbers of deaths from Ebola fever.
During what has been designated 'Operation United Assistance' U.S. military engineers will build 17 treatment centres, each with a 100-bed capacity, across Liberia. A 25-bed hospital to treat infected healthcare workers is also being prepared to be sent to Liberia.
65 United States Public Health Commissioned Officers will be deployed to manage and staff that hospital. 400,000 basic Ebola fever response kits will be supplied to households in Liberia. It will include sanitisers.
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is also bringing in 50,000 home health-care kits from Denmark, which specially trained young volunteers will distribute to people living in remote rural communities in Liberia, according to the same Washington Post news report by Lena Hunt.
The U.S. military and specialists from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will also help train up to 500 healthcare professionals a week in West Africa - in the care and treatment of those infected with the Ebola fever virus. The CDC already has as many as 100 specialists in west Africa currently.
Now that the U.S. military is stepping in to work with international organisations on the ground in west Africa, such as: Doctors Without Borders, other international NGO's like Samaritan's Purse and healthcare professionals in the overwhelmed healthcare systems of the three hardest-hit nations experiencing the Ebola fever outbreak, one's hope is that the frightening projections of as many as over some 250,000 people eventually becoming infected with the Ebola fever virus across west Africa (including Ghana), will not now materialise.
We must be thankful that at long last, the world's best-equipped military force is stepping in to help contain and halt the spread of the Ebola fever virus in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone - as well as help train as many as 500 healthcare professionals a week, from across the region, in the treatment and care of Ebola fever patients.
That really is good news - for which we must all thank the government and people of the U.S.A.
And one is also certain that the leaders and citizens of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, will also be grateful that whiles others shunned them, Ghana's President Mahama came to visit them: to show his solidarity in the face of a common danger that threatens all of west Africa, as well as to donate food items to Ebola fever patients in the three sister nations.
Thank goodness that substantial help is now finally coming to Ebola-stricken Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone: as the world wakes up to the dangers of a virus that has the potential to wipe out many if it is not contained within the next six months.
Saturday, 13 September 2014
How Ghana's 2014 FIFA World Cup Presidential Commission Can Outflank The GFA
There is no question that many football fans in Ghana are glad that President Mahama set up a presidential commission to look into Ghana's participation in the 2014 FIFA World Cup tournament in Brazil.
Those of us who initially advocated that that be done, immediately after the debacle in Brazil, are certainly glad that the powers that be did so - and what shocking revelations there have been, thus far, at the public sittings of that commission.
For many taxpayers in Ghana, it is intolerable that whiles it has been happy to accept money from the national treasury over the years, the Ghana Football Association (GFA), has been quick to hide behind so-called "rules of FIFA" (to use the French acronym for the French version of the organisation's English name, International Federation of Football Associations), to stop outsiders from conducting any investigations into its affairs.
Yet, there is a need to ensure that the GFA does not use its control of football in Ghana to misuse hapless Ghanaian taxpayers' money doled out to it by the government. Who, for example, will pay for that mercenary Serbian coach's salary, one wonders - taxpayers or the sly and opaque GFA?
(The shabby and disgraceful treatment meted out to the just-dismissed Black Stars coach, Kwesi Appiah, is rock-solid evidence of the GFA's perfidy, incidentally. Hopefully, Kwesi Appiah will sue them in the law courts for breach of contract. Dismissing him for "bad faith" when he was only speaking the truth about a blatant lie the GFA wanted kept secret - that Kwesi Appiah had agreed to accept a technical director when he had not - is against natural justice and an abuse of his human right to speak out boldly: when confronted with an unacceptable and immoral conspiracy to foist a lie on the general public. In that instance, it was the GFA conspirators that showed bad faith, not Kwesi Appiah. He would be wise to appear before the commission to give them an insider's view of the shennanigens in the GFA, to help clean up the administration of soccer in Ghana. But I digress.)
It is therefore vital that members of the presidential commission enquiring into the events surrounding Ghana's senior men's national soccer team's participation in the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil, and the actions and inactions of those who organised it, ensure, when writing their final report, that based on their recommendations, in future no individual or groups of individuals can misuse taxpayers' money, in organising Ghana's participation in such international soccer tournaments.
To do so, they must set out in detail, precisely what kind of relationship the government ought to have with the GFA - to guide all future allocations of taxpayers' money for Ghana's various national soccer teams to participate in tournaments organised by FIFA and its affiliate, the Confederation of African Football (CAF).
Since the GFA is clearly unwilling to allow outsiders to investigate its finances, if they can get away with it, the presidential commission would be wise to talk to the English Football Association (FA) - between which, and Sep Blatter's FIFA, there is little love lost, incidentally.
The English FA will happily provide the presidential commission's members with all the information they require about its financial relationship, if any, with the UK government. Who pays England's coach's salary, for example? Ditto airline tickets for England's players and technical team when playing FIFA World Cup qualfyinfg matches abroad - the FA or the UK government?
And it will also give them a breakdown of all the funds they receive regularly from FIFA, for the development of the game in England. Ditto its (group-stage) share of the profits that FIFA distributed as prize money, out of the US$567 million it set aside for that purpose, to all the participating teams in the 2014 FIFA World Cup tournament in Brazil. (What, for example, is their opinion about a national team's "management committee" members allocating "appearance fees" given to the players participating in a FIFA World Cup tournament to themselves too? They would be horrified to hear that that was the case for Ghana's senior men's national soccer team in the Brazil 2014 FIFA World Cup tournament, no doubt. But again, I digress.)
By talking to the English FA, the presidential commission looking into the events surrounding Ghana's participation in the 2014 FIFA World Cup tournament in Brazil, will be able to protect the interest of taxpayers when writing their final report, and ensure that Ghanaian government officials and the GFA, do not misuse funds allocated by the government for Ghana's participation in international football tournament matches, going forward.
In other words, the presidential commission investigating events surrounding Ghana's participation in the 2014 FIFA World Cup tournament in Brazil, can outflank the GFA, by talking directly to the English FA about the exact nature of its financial relationship with the UK government.
It can also discover from the English FA, what funds FIFA allocates to national football associations, if any, and for what purposes those funds are for - by asking them all the questions they would have wanted to ask the GFA but feel unable to, because it hides behind so-called FIFA "rules and regulations".
Ghanaians are fed up to the backteeth with the fact that no one in this country seems able to investigate allegations of corrupt practices in the GFA. Enough is enough. The presidential commission ought to talk to the English FA as soon as practicable. The GFA must be outflanked to discover the truth about its finances - and to find out whether or not it is taking Ghanaian taxpayers for a gigantic ride. A word to the wise...
Those of us who initially advocated that that be done, immediately after the debacle in Brazil, are certainly glad that the powers that be did so - and what shocking revelations there have been, thus far, at the public sittings of that commission.
For many taxpayers in Ghana, it is intolerable that whiles it has been happy to accept money from the national treasury over the years, the Ghana Football Association (GFA), has been quick to hide behind so-called "rules of FIFA" (to use the French acronym for the French version of the organisation's English name, International Federation of Football Associations), to stop outsiders from conducting any investigations into its affairs.
Yet, there is a need to ensure that the GFA does not use its control of football in Ghana to misuse hapless Ghanaian taxpayers' money doled out to it by the government. Who, for example, will pay for that mercenary Serbian coach's salary, one wonders - taxpayers or the sly and opaque GFA?
(The shabby and disgraceful treatment meted out to the just-dismissed Black Stars coach, Kwesi Appiah, is rock-solid evidence of the GFA's perfidy, incidentally. Hopefully, Kwesi Appiah will sue them in the law courts for breach of contract. Dismissing him for "bad faith" when he was only speaking the truth about a blatant lie the GFA wanted kept secret - that Kwesi Appiah had agreed to accept a technical director when he had not - is against natural justice and an abuse of his human right to speak out boldly: when confronted with an unacceptable and immoral conspiracy to foist a lie on the general public. In that instance, it was the GFA conspirators that showed bad faith, not Kwesi Appiah. He would be wise to appear before the commission to give them an insider's view of the shennanigens in the GFA, to help clean up the administration of soccer in Ghana. But I digress.)
It is therefore vital that members of the presidential commission enquiring into the events surrounding Ghana's senior men's national soccer team's participation in the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil, and the actions and inactions of those who organised it, ensure, when writing their final report, that based on their recommendations, in future no individual or groups of individuals can misuse taxpayers' money, in organising Ghana's participation in such international soccer tournaments.
To do so, they must set out in detail, precisely what kind of relationship the government ought to have with the GFA - to guide all future allocations of taxpayers' money for Ghana's various national soccer teams to participate in tournaments organised by FIFA and its affiliate, the Confederation of African Football (CAF).
Since the GFA is clearly unwilling to allow outsiders to investigate its finances, if they can get away with it, the presidential commission would be wise to talk to the English Football Association (FA) - between which, and Sep Blatter's FIFA, there is little love lost, incidentally.
The English FA will happily provide the presidential commission's members with all the information they require about its financial relationship, if any, with the UK government. Who pays England's coach's salary, for example? Ditto airline tickets for England's players and technical team when playing FIFA World Cup qualfyinfg matches abroad - the FA or the UK government?
And it will also give them a breakdown of all the funds they receive regularly from FIFA, for the development of the game in England. Ditto its (group-stage) share of the profits that FIFA distributed as prize money, out of the US$567 million it set aside for that purpose, to all the participating teams in the 2014 FIFA World Cup tournament in Brazil. (What, for example, is their opinion about a national team's "management committee" members allocating "appearance fees" given to the players participating in a FIFA World Cup tournament to themselves too? They would be horrified to hear that that was the case for Ghana's senior men's national soccer team in the Brazil 2014 FIFA World Cup tournament, no doubt. But again, I digress.)
By talking to the English FA, the presidential commission looking into the events surrounding Ghana's participation in the 2014 FIFA World Cup tournament in Brazil, will be able to protect the interest of taxpayers when writing their final report, and ensure that Ghanaian government officials and the GFA, do not misuse funds allocated by the government for Ghana's participation in international football tournament matches, going forward.
In other words, the presidential commission investigating events surrounding Ghana's participation in the 2014 FIFA World Cup tournament in Brazil, can outflank the GFA, by talking directly to the English FA about the exact nature of its financial relationship with the UK government.
It can also discover from the English FA, what funds FIFA allocates to national football associations, if any, and for what purposes those funds are for - by asking them all the questions they would have wanted to ask the GFA but feel unable to, because it hides behind so-called FIFA "rules and regulations".
Ghanaians are fed up to the backteeth with the fact that no one in this country seems able to investigate allegations of corrupt practices in the GFA. Enough is enough. The presidential commission ought to talk to the English FA as soon as practicable. The GFA must be outflanked to discover the truth about its finances - and to find out whether or not it is taking Ghanaian taxpayers for a gigantic ride. A word to the wise...
Friday, 12 September 2014
Monday, 8 September 2014
U.S. Ebola Doctor Reveals How American Healthcare Professionals Infected In West Africa Were Cured
Ebola Doctor Reveals How Infected Americans Were Curedh,
Techniques used in the U.S. to treat symptoms and subdue the virus in patients could work overseas, Bruce Ribner says
Photo courtesy of PhotoDisc/GettyImage
[An edited transcript of the interview follows.]
Are Brantly and Writebol now immune to the Zaire strain of Ebola?
In general, patients who have recovered from Ebola virus infection do develop a very robust immunity to the virus. They develop antibodies against the virus and they also develop cell-mediated immunity—the lymphocytes important to form viral control of pathogens. In general, the finding is it’s basically like being immunized—it would be unusual to get infection with the same strain.
Will that immunity afford them protection against other strains of Ebola?
We are still evaluating that in our two patients. Cross-protection is not quite as robust. There are five strains of Ebola viruses. Even though that data is not great, the feeling is there is potential for being infected if you go to a different part of Africa and get exposed to a different strain.
You said “still evaluating.” Are you still caring for Brantly and Writebol?
We are going to be following those two patients as outpatients, and as part of our evaluation they have agreed to undergo additional testing so we can better understand immunity to Ebola virus. We are meeting with them periodically.
What sort of lessons has Emory learned from caring for these two people that would be transferrable to patients in west Africa?
We are not being critical of our colleagues in west Africa. They suffer from a terrible lack of infrastructure and the sort of testing that everyone in our society takes for granted, such as the ability to do a complete blood count—measuring your red blood cells, your white blood cells and your platelets—which is done as part of any standard checkup here. The facility in Liberia where our two patients were didn’t even have this simple thing, which everyone assumes is done as part of your annual physical.
What we found in general is that among our Ebola patients, because of the amount of fluid they lost through diarrhea and vomiting, they had a lot of electrolyte abnormalities. And so replacing that with standard fluids [used in hospital settings] without monitoring will not do a very good job of replacing things like sodium and potassium. In both of our patients we found those levels to be very low. One of the messages we will be sending back to our colleagues is even if you don’t have the equipment to measure these levels, do be aware this is occurring when patients are having a lot of body fluid loss.
Our two patients also gained an enormous amount of fluid in their tissues, what we call edema. In Ebola virus disease there is damage to the liver and the liver no longer makes sufficient amount of protein; the proteins in the blood are very low and there is an enormous amount of fluid leakage out into the tissues. So one of the takeaway messages is to pay closer attention to that and perhaps early on try to replace some of these proteins that patients’ livers lack.
Considering how limited resources are in some of these facilities, could health care workers really act on this information?
I think the world is becoming aware that issues like this are not going to go away. The developed countries of the world will have to do our part to assist our colleagues with less developed infrastructure to care for sick people. I think one of the messages that is going out from many sources is we really have to help countries such as the ones involved in this outbreak to develop their medical infrastructure. Hopefully in five years they will have this infrastructure.
You have said that you are helping to develop new Ebola care guidelines based on your experience. How will those be disseminated?
We have several articles that we have submitted to major medical journals, which are read overseas, where we will be pointing this out. We are working with several government agencies, including the U.S. State Department, to help them come up with lessons learned—guidelines which they will distribute in turn to other countries. It is our goal to help our colleagues overseas.
Alternatively, what lessons did you learn from those health care workers?
Mostly the clinical course of the patients—much like any physician sending a patient to a referral center. They admitted they knew they were kind of flying blind. They’d say, “this is what we observed but we had no way to test it.”
The World Health Organization maintains that patients can continue to be infectious via their sexual fluids for several months after recovery. What did you recommend to Brantly and Writebol?
There are data that go back several decades—over several outbreaks—that suggest when you have individuals that have recovered from Ebola virus infection they may still be shedding nuclear material [genetic material from the virus which could potentially help spread it] in semen in males and vaginal secretions in females and also, potentially in urine. People have done this by doing assays looking specifically at the nuclear material of the virus. There has been very little attempt to demonstrate if this is viable virus that these individuals are shedding. It’s important when looking at epidemiological investigations that no one has been able to show people shedding these nuclear materials as a source of infection after they are discharged.
Looking at Ebola survivors who were discharged and successfully resolved the infection, following up several months later and evaluating their family members, there has never been any evidence that family members became infected. A lot of the thinking now is this probably was not live and is not important in terms of control of infection. We did give both of our patients the standard recommendations, which are contained on the CDC [U.S. Centers for Disease Control] Web site—not having unprotected sex for three months.
How many doctors and nurses were on your team caring for these two Ebola patients?
Twenty-one nurses, five physicians and we had the support of hundreds. Just making sure all the disposables coming out of those rooms were sterilized before we put them on the federal highway system, for example—we had to certify to the contractor that takes our regulated medical waste that it didn’t have active Ebola virus inside it. We didn’t have the equipment to handle all of the waste but in two hours facilities brought in industrial autoclaves [which sterilize materials with extreme heat] to replace the system that we had. We would have been drowning in garbage without them.
It has been reported that Brantly received a blood transfusion from a recovered patient. What role might that have played and is it being tried in other contexts?
I wouldn’t be able to tell you what I read in his chart. The most accurate thing to say is we don’t have a clue [what role a blood transfusion could play]. It’s not part of our standard treatment in our country. We wouldn’t have any idea whether he benefited or it was detrimental.
Are current diagnostics to identify Ebola virus disease adequate for this outbreak?
Certainly in the United States they are adequate. The major way one would diagnose Ebola virus disease is through a process called PCR or polymerase chain reaction, where you take the patient’s blood, put it in a machine and it tells you in a few hours if the nuclear material from the Ebola virus is present. CDC is doing that for patients coming back from infected areas where virus is a potential. There are a number of labs, both local and courtesy of CDC, that are doing this testing in west Africa, and my sense is it’s not that difficult to get it done.
This past week WHO announced that one of its workers has been infected with Ebola virus disease and that person was given the option of being sent to a different country for treatment. A British nurse also contracted the virus and went home to the U.K. for care. What’s the value of getting treated elsewhere?
Given that there is no treatment for Ebola virus disease, the main intervention that will determine if someone lives or dies with this infection is supportive care: The ability to replace fluid and electrolytes if a patient is losing them. The ability to replace platelets if that count is low and a patient is starting to bleed. The ability to replace protein in the blood that may be deficient. A developed country has the capability because of our infrastructure to provide that level of support is at a much higher level than a hospital dealing with patients in west Africa.
Among the handful of patients that received the experimental drug ZMapp, some have died. Considering the mortality rate for the current Ebola strain is almost 50 percent what can we say about ZMapp?
Experimental drugs are experimental drugs because we don’t know if they will work. That is true both with the preparations patients received in Liberia and other preparations that are being considered for treating patients with this infectious disease. We are a long way from being able to say that someone that received one of these agents benefited, it had no impact or it may be that their outcome may be impeded. Until we have good studies looking at outcomes of patients who received these medications, compared to patients who didn’t receive them, we should be very cautious.
I would go further to say that there is a fair amount of almost hysteria and people feeling they must have these preparations to survive. In the past people thought they needed agents for treatment, and the agents actually turned out to impair people’s ability to survive. The focus should remain on aggressive intensive care and the ability to correct abnormalities metabolically, rather than receiving any magic vaccine or product that may or may not improve survival.
For example, there used to be a belief that patients who had bacterial sepsis did much better if you gave them high doses of steroids. Now we know that these may be detrimental instead of beneficial. We know now since we’ve done the studies. Again, it was one of those things where people felt like “yeah this should be” but when they did the study in randomized patients they found it didn’t work at all.
As you know, two upcoming clinical trials will be looking at potential Ebola vaccines, and there are also a variety of experimental therapies that are being discussed in the U.S. and elsewhere beyond ZMapp. How should such information be coordinated? Does there need to be an entity overseeing that?
Given that we have multiple countries I don’t know that you can have any one entity. It’s tricky enough having the FDA [U.S. Food and Drug Administration] monitor what is going on in the United States. Clearly if you are talking about Canadian studies or European products, I don’t know that there is any entity that can provide that sort of coordination. My guess is that most of the manufacturers are aware of what the others are doing and are comparing notes because they feel it’s to their benefit to work together.
An ethics panel from WHO recently said that it is ethical to give out experimental treatments to Ebola patients, but it has not yet specified who should have priority in such circumstances or how such drugs should be doled out. They are taking up that issue at a meeting next week. What’s your thought?
I think it’s certainly ethical to study experimental biologicals and vaccines but we have to be extremely cautious. It’s not as though we have something that we know works. To say that anyone is withholding products implies we know that there’s a benefit, which gives me pause because we are a long long way from demonstrating that these offer any benefit in humans.
Is there anything you would like to add about insights you learned from your Ebola patient care?
The major thing I hope people have appreciated is there was a lot of anxiety, a lot of negative comment about our bringing these two patients back to our facility to care for them. Most of that we attribute to poor education, and I’m hoping that since we were successful in helping them resolve their infections it helps to dispel the idea that this is a disease that by nature has to be fatal. As we have been saying all along, we feel that the high fatality rates in developing parts of the world where this infection occurs are because of the lack of resources. We had always felt that the survival of patients with proper support would be a lot better than in developing countries.
The other thing I would hope we would get across to the public is this is a disease where we don’t have to have a lot of secondary infections—if we follow standard infection-control procedures. We had 26 people giving direct patient care to these patients and we did not have any secondary infections at all, and that’s as we expected.
We were using contact precautions and droplet precautions. Fortunately, we don’t have to go to that level of protection [wearing protective full-body suits like in west Africa]. You wear whatever you need so that the blood and body secretions don’t come into contact with you, depending on the quantity of fluids. We used gowns and gloves and foot coverings of the health care workers in order to prevent contact with the body materials of these individuals. Our approach was what CDC recommends: you wear a mask and goggles or a face shield to prevent that infection. Some of the nurses spending three to four hours in patients’ rooms were more comfortable wearing hoods than masks and face shields, though those would have been adequate. We can manage care with minimal chance for secondary spread. It’s not as though we brought the plague to American shores.''
End of culled article written by Dina Fine Maron and posted in the August 27, 2014 online edition of the Scientific American magazine.
Wednesday, 3 September 2014
Ghana's Leaders Must Stop Selling Their Nation Short
One often wonders, whether there are moments of quiet reflection, during which many patriotic Ghanaians ponder over what could possibly be the rationale for the many one-sided agreements, which some of their nation's leaders end up signing with foreign investors - even though those agreements are detrimental to Ghana's long-term interests.
Could it perhaps also be the case that those discerning and independent-minded Ghanaian patriots, find it baffling that on top of that outrage, there are many leading politicians (mostly highly-intelligent and well-educated individuals) prepared to publicly justify even the most reprehensible and unjustifiable of agreements, which Ghana signs with foreign multinational corporations?
The question then is: What motivates those highly-placed public officials and politicians, who let Ghana down so badly, by approving such detrimental agreements? Do they never think of the well-being of their nation and the welfare of its people?
If we had 60/40 percent production-sharing agreements in Ghana's favour, for example, instead of being lumbered with the world's worst oil agreements with foreign oil companies, Ghana could literally self-finance: all planned modernisation and expansion projects to enhance its infrastructure; provide well-designed and well-built affordable housing in new green cities nationwide; provide free education from kindergarten to tertiary level for all those with the aptitude to study; as well as give all its citizens free quality-healthcare in world-class hospitals - meaning that ordinary Ghanaians would be able to enjoy the same high standards of living enjoyed by the citizens of Saudi Arabia and the wealthy Arabian Gulf states (all of which incidentally have production-sharing agreements with foreign oil companies, it must be noted).
And yet another example of an odious, selling-Ghana-short-agreement that is detrimental to Ghana's long-term interests, is the Atuabo port agreement between Ghana and Lonrho - which was rubber-stamped by a Parliament constitutionally mandated to scrutinise and prevent Ghana from being lumbered with precisely such patently unfair agreements.
Predictably, and true to form, many leading members of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), are trying to justify what is an egregious example of the socialisation of private risk.
Clearly, Lonrho wants to take advantage of all the opportunities inherent in a market economy - but it also wants to eat its cake and have it in Ghana's case.
"They have no doubt had excellent coaching lessons from the foreign oil companies with whom they are planning to prosper mightily together at Mother Ghana's expense", to quote an old wag I know.
So, today, Lonrho wants the state in what is an African democracy, and a free society in which the rule of law prevails, to protect it from potential competitors - by granting it a virtual monopoly that flagrantly flouts our laws (Section 5 (1) of PNDC Law 160 of 1986, which established the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority). How can that be?
Yet, only recently, the NDC's Mr. Amertepe Kwame, claimed on Peace FM's Kokrokoo morning show programme that in seeking to prevent potential competitors from engaging in the same kinds of businesses sought by Lonrho, in the Atuabo port agreement with Ghana, the NDC government was only seeking to protect the company's investment. Amazing.
Perhaps the question that the Amertepe Kwames in our midst ought to ponder over is: Would Lonrho have dared to demand the same outrageous terms and conditions from the authorities in either the UK or Germany (or elsewhere in the rest of the European Union (EU) for that matter), in a proposal for an agreement to invest in building a new port along their coastline? Definitely not, is the short answer.
A long-standing policy of the authorities in all the EU member states (and the European Commission itself in its Brussels headquarters) has been to ensure that competition is never compromised in all such instances.
That is why active steps have always been taken by the European Commission and the authorities in all the EU member-states to prevent companies from establishing monopolies when investing in their national economies. Why then should the situation be any different for Lonrho in Ghana?
Has competition in the telecoms sector, for example, in which foreign telecommunications companies have invested billions of dollars, not benefitted the Ghanaian economy?
In addition to giving consumers affordable access to sundry wireless broadband internet services, and connecting millions of mobile phone users to each other across the country, have they not created employment opportunities for tens of thousands countrywide, despite the intense competition in the industry?
For the information of the Amertepe Kwames, the only 'protection' that any government in the 4th Republic can lawfully offer any foreign investor - at any given point in time - is the constitutional guarantee that legitimate businesses of theirs will not be expropriated. Nothing more, nothing less.
(And lest they forget, the something-for-nothing-ripp-off-culture that prevailed during the colonial era, which enabled unimaginable wealth acquired through scandalous profiteering to be shipped out of Africa, was supposed to have ended some 57 odd years ago in Ghana - when Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah's Convention People's Party (CPP) government took over the running of the country from the British colonialists who once occupied it. But I digress.)
With respect, do we not operate a market economy in Ghana - and therefore, presumably rely on market forces, not the power of the state, to determine the eventual fate of companies investing in our national economy: be they domestic or foreign?
Could it perhaps also be the case that those discerning and independent-minded Ghanaian patriots, find it baffling that on top of that outrage, there are many leading politicians (mostly highly-intelligent and well-educated individuals) prepared to publicly justify even the most reprehensible and unjustifiable of agreements, which Ghana signs with foreign multinational corporations?
The question then is: What motivates those highly-placed public officials and politicians, who let Ghana down so badly, by approving such detrimental agreements? Do they never think of the well-being of their nation and the welfare of its people?
If we had 60/40 percent production-sharing agreements in Ghana's favour, for example, instead of being lumbered with the world's worst oil agreements with foreign oil companies, Ghana could literally self-finance: all planned modernisation and expansion projects to enhance its infrastructure; provide well-designed and well-built affordable housing in new green cities nationwide; provide free education from kindergarten to tertiary level for all those with the aptitude to study; as well as give all its citizens free quality-healthcare in world-class hospitals - meaning that ordinary Ghanaians would be able to enjoy the same high standards of living enjoyed by the citizens of Saudi Arabia and the wealthy Arabian Gulf states (all of which incidentally have production-sharing agreements with foreign oil companies, it must be noted).
And yet another example of an odious, selling-Ghana-short-agreement that is detrimental to Ghana's long-term interests, is the Atuabo port agreement between Ghana and Lonrho - which was rubber-stamped by a Parliament constitutionally mandated to scrutinise and prevent Ghana from being lumbered with precisely such patently unfair agreements.
Predictably, and true to form, many leading members of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), are trying to justify what is an egregious example of the socialisation of private risk.
Clearly, Lonrho wants to take advantage of all the opportunities inherent in a market economy - but it also wants to eat its cake and have it in Ghana's case.
"They have no doubt had excellent coaching lessons from the foreign oil companies with whom they are planning to prosper mightily together at Mother Ghana's expense", to quote an old wag I know.
So, today, Lonrho wants the state in what is an African democracy, and a free society in which the rule of law prevails, to protect it from potential competitors - by granting it a virtual monopoly that flagrantly flouts our laws (Section 5 (1) of PNDC Law 160 of 1986, which established the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority). How can that be?
Yet, only recently, the NDC's Mr. Amertepe Kwame, claimed on Peace FM's Kokrokoo morning show programme that in seeking to prevent potential competitors from engaging in the same kinds of businesses sought by Lonrho, in the Atuabo port agreement with Ghana, the NDC government was only seeking to protect the company's investment. Amazing.
Perhaps the question that the Amertepe Kwames in our midst ought to ponder over is: Would Lonrho have dared to demand the same outrageous terms and conditions from the authorities in either the UK or Germany (or elsewhere in the rest of the European Union (EU) for that matter), in a proposal for an agreement to invest in building a new port along their coastline? Definitely not, is the short answer.
A long-standing policy of the authorities in all the EU member states (and the European Commission itself in its Brussels headquarters) has been to ensure that competition is never compromised in all such instances.
That is why active steps have always been taken by the European Commission and the authorities in all the EU member-states to prevent companies from establishing monopolies when investing in their national economies. Why then should the situation be any different for Lonrho in Ghana?
Has competition in the telecoms sector, for example, in which foreign telecommunications companies have invested billions of dollars, not benefitted the Ghanaian economy?
In addition to giving consumers affordable access to sundry wireless broadband internet services, and connecting millions of mobile phone users to each other across the country, have they not created employment opportunities for tens of thousands countrywide, despite the intense competition in the industry?
For the information of the Amertepe Kwames, the only 'protection' that any government in the 4th Republic can lawfully offer any foreign investor - at any given point in time - is the constitutional guarantee that legitimate businesses of theirs will not be expropriated. Nothing more, nothing less.
(And lest they forget, the something-for-nothing-ripp-off-culture that prevailed during the colonial era, which enabled unimaginable wealth acquired through scandalous profiteering to be shipped out of Africa, was supposed to have ended some 57 odd years ago in Ghana - when Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah's Convention People's Party (CPP) government took over the running of the country from the British colonialists who once occupied it. But I digress.)
With respect, do we not operate a market economy in Ghana - and therefore, presumably rely on market forces, not the power of the state, to determine the eventual fate of companies investing in our national economy: be they domestic or foreign?
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