22 Key QUOTES from President Mahama’s Digital Conversation

I console bereaved families and commend our gallant health workers and our men and women in uniform for their sacrifices towards our common quest to heal our land of COVID-19.

… we owe it to the Ghanaian people to ensure that every attention, decision, every human and material resource, should be aimed solely at stopping the spread of the (COVID-19) virus.

In all these, my thoughts have also been on the state of our country after the pandemic.

While it is the prerogative of the President to take the decisions that ensure our safety and protection, it is my hope that his decisions are guided by a genuine concern for the health and safety of the people of Ghana, and also guided by Science, not any political or parochial considerations.

I must say, I am deeply concerned about the health and safety of our health workers considering that there are still loud complaints from many health facilities about the lack of basic protective gear.

Now that the lockdown has been lifted and the virus is mobile again, we must heed to the call to always wear face masks or face coverings in all public places.

You can buy ventilators and other medical items on the market, but you cannot go to the market and buy skilled doctors and nurses and other medical staff.

As it is, we are relying on hope. Hope is good, but science helps you to hope better.

It is important to note that Government’s humanitarian intervention to alleviate the unintended but predictable consequences of the lockdown were an abysmal failure.

With a budget in excess of GH¢1.2 billion we could have handled this mitigation effort much better than we did.

Social Security contributions are essentially an insurance scheme made not just for pensions in old age before we die. They are also meant to help contributors in times of adversity such as this.

Let’s all join hands in demanding accountability and transparency from Government in the management of the COVID-19 funds.

I wish to also repeat my call for Government to ensure a reduction in the cost of internet because students and pupils need internet to study from home.

Let me also encourage the need to allow for flexibility at work places in order that people can work from home where and when necessary.

It does not help our collective fight against the virus when some overzealous appointees resort to insulting persons who question the information being put out by Government.

While thinking and working locally we must also keep an eye on treatment and/or vaccines development.

I called a few weeks ago for a virtual ECOWAS summit in order to coordinate our response to the pandemic in respect of border restrictions and subregion wide COVID-19 response measures. I am heartened to hear that such a meeting is planned in order to better coordinate our fight against the virus. This is necessary in order to avoid unilateralism in what is a collective struggle.

We are dealing with a new disease and are not yet sure how it will behave going forward.

We need to see from the government that leads us, a demonstration of trust and respect for all, no matter which people are involved, or where they are coming from.

We must be open to constructive criticism and be receptive to pragmatic suggestions from the experts because these are critical ingredients that engender trust- and a collective will to support the battle we are engaged in with this pandemic.

It is not too late for us to unite, truly unite, be transparent and accountable to the people.

Fellow Ghanaians, we are not in normal times. We must all put our shoulders to the wheel with patriotic zeal devoid of partisanship and parochial interest and help with all our hearts and might to fight COVID-19 aggressively and decisively.