Ghana Armed Forces
The Charismatic Bishops’ Conference (CBC) wants military intervention to end the armed robbery scourge in the country.
According to them, the current approach towards eradicating armed robbery in the country has failed and so military approach should be unleashed on the robbers to stem the tide.
“There is no region of Ghana that is safe from armed robbery,” the bishops said in a communique to mark Ghana’s 60th independence anniversary, adding, “Students in universities cannot walk freely on campuses. Student hostels are routinely attacked.”
They wondered, “What is the use of an army if people do not feel safe in their own country? Why are we maintaining such an institution with tax payers’ money if it is not benefiting the nation?”
‘Release Equipment’
They said the military should be able to release their equipment and their highly-trained professionals “to be involved in wiping out armed robbery.”
The CBC observed, “After 60 years of managing our own affairs, it should not be that buses need escorts to travel on certain roads during day or at night.”
The bishops said, “Let us be practical. It is not the duty of the police . It is the duty of all Ghanaians, including the army, to ensure that Ghana is a safe place again.”
‘O’ & ‘A’ Level
The bishops agreed that it was time for the government to ‘re-introduce’ the General Certificate Examination (GCE) Ordinary (’O’) and Advanced (‘A’)” level systems to “restore the integrity of formal education in Ghana.”
According to them, “’O’ and ‘A’ level education are better than what we currently have. Ghana has been subjected to an inferior form of education through the JHS and SHS for many years.
“We call the JHS and SHS an inferior form of education because international universities require our SHS graduates to do a foundational course for a whole year before admitting them to the universities proper. Years ago, graduates from secondary schools in Ghana did not have to do such foundational courses because they already had a good foundation.
“We call the JHS and SHS an inferior form of education because we have reason to doubt the current ability of the WAEC to conduct credible examinations. It is common knowledge that the examinations are flawed with serious leakages, such that many students today do not know how to study, unless they have seen leaked papers.”
Chicken Ban
CBC called on the government to ban the importation of chicken to save the country’s poultry industry and create employment.
It noted that the sector had in the past few years regressed due to government agreements and said, “That has made poultry farmers poorer.”
It noted, “Some prominent poultry businesses in the country have been wiped out before our eyes and made incapable of producing poultry for consumption in the country. It does not make sense to have poultry farms any longer because a locally grown chicken is sold for GH¢40, while the imported ones are sold for GH¢15.”
Road Toll
The bishops admonished the government not to allow tolls collected along major highways to be deposited into central government funds, and suggested that they must be used entirely for maintaining and managing those roads where the tolls are collected.
They called for a shift from asphalt road construction to the use of concrete and said that government should move away from securing loans from foreign donors for road construction but rather utilize local materials and local people.
“It is time to govern and lead our nation in a new way! The old ways have been tried and tested for sixty years. It is clear that the old ways are not working,” it observed.
By William Yaw Owusu
