Daily Heritage December 15

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DAILY
Politics
WWW.DAILYHERITAGE.COM.GH
HERITAGE FRIDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2017
We won’t allow Liberia to slide
back into instability, conflict – Prez
NEWS DESK REPORT
PRESIDENT Nana
Addo Dankwa Akufo-
Addo says West Africa
is not prepared to contemplate
the scenario
of Liberia sliding back into instability
and conflict.
According to President Akufo-
Addo, the Economic Community
of West African States
(ECOWAS), over the years, has
made a huge investment in promoting
peace in Liberia, and “we
will do all we can to ensure that
democracy is entrenched in
Liberia, and we will not accept any
other outcome.”
The President said the December
7, 2017 ruling made by
Liberia’s Supreme Court on their
presidential election must ensure
that Liberia will have its first
peaceful handover of power from
one democratically elected leader
to another in 73 years.
“The work undertaken by that
truly historic figure, the first
elected female leader of an African
nation, Her Excellency Ellen Johnson
Sirleaf, in stabilising the country,
after a bitter and protracted
civil war, has been very solid and
commendable,” he said.
The President continued, “I am
anticipating that at the end of the
day, Liberia’s institutions, particularly
the Supreme Court and the
Electoral Commission, will be up
to the task, and shepherd the
country through a successful
transition.”
President Akufo-Addo made
this known on Wednesday, December
13, 2017, when he delivered
the Commencement
Address at the 98th Commencement
Exercises of the
University of Liberia, in Monrovia.
Transform structure
of African economies
With over 2,500 students
graduating from the University,
the President noted that it is
not enough to hold successful
elections every four years or to
be able to criticize the government
and to have a choice of
100 radio stations.
Democracy, he explained,
must ensure that we are able to
provide our people with a good
quality of life.
“The structure of
economies, bequeathed to us by
colonialism, was dependent on
the production and export of
raw materials. Even though Liberia
was not colonised, the structure of
her economy remains very much
the same as the others on the continent.
Such economies cannot create
opportunities, prosperity and
wealth for our people,” he said.
“Too many of our
peoples are still
kept down by extreme
poverty. The
promise of prosperity
that was to
accompany freedom
has not materialised
for the
mass of the
African peoples,
and has rather
been replaced with
widespread despondency
across
the continent. This
is not what our
forebears promised,
•President Akufo-Addo delivers address at the 98th Commencement Exercises of the University of Liberia
President Akufo-Addo stressed
that the time is long overdue for
Africa to transform the structure
of African economies to serve better
the needs of the African peoples.
Promise of prosperity
“Too many of our peoples are
still kept down by extreme
poverty. The promise of prosperity
that was to accompany freedom
has not materialised for the
mass of the African peoples, and
has rather been replaced with
widespread despondency across
the continent. This is not what
our forebears promised,” he said.
President Akufo-Addo, therefore,
urged “the current generation”
of African youths to meet
the challenges of today, and help
banish the disgraceful spectre of
young Africans, taking harrowing
risks in trekking the Sahara desert
or drowning in the Mediterranean,
seeking greener pastures in Europe.
“Your generation has to ensure
the fulfilment of the statement,
made almost 70 years ago in 1949
to the Gold Coast Legislative Assembly
by Joseph Boakye Danquah,
the father of modern
Ghanaian nationalism, that ‘the
two things go together, economic
freedom and political freedom.
And we must have the two together
in this very age, and in the
shortest possible time’,” President
Akufo-Addo added.
Democratic
accountability
To this end, President Akufo-
Addo stressed that a new paradigm
of leadership on the continent is
called for, that is, “leaders who are
committed to governing their peoples
according to the rule of law,
respect for individual liberties,
human rights, the principles of
democratic accountability and social
justice; leaders who are looking
past commodities to position their
countries in the global marketplace”.
The President also called for
“leaders who are determined to
free their peoples from a mindset
of dependence, aid, charity and
hand-outs; leaders who are bent on
mobilizing Africa’s own immeasurable
resources to resolve Africa’s
problems; leaders who recognise
the connectedness of their peoples
and economies to those of their
neighbours.”
This new generation of African
leaders, the President added,
“should help bring dignity and
prosperity to our continent and its
long-suffering peoples.”
“Your generation
has to ensure the
fulfilment of the
statement, made
almost 70 years
ago in 1949 to the
Gold Coast Legislative
Assembly by
Joseph Boakye
Danquah, the father
of modern
Ghanaian nationalism,
that ‘the two
things go together,
economic freedom
and political freedom.