Ghana, 2014

Change has become an

overriding theme in the language of today`s social and

political landscape. We speak of the need to change

behaviours, attitudes and laws. We speak of the need

to effect change in the areas of human rights and social

justice, in education and health administration. We

have come to understand the concept of change as a

constant in our lives as human beings and as citizens

of this world. But the question we are asking is, does

change automatically signify progress?

There is an old saying with which I am sure everyone

here is familiar: the more things change, the more they

stay the same. Sometimes, when I find myself listening

to reports of the many recent developments taking place

in the world, that saying comes to mind again, and I am

overcome with a strong sense of déjà vu, as though we

had been here before.

When I hear reports about the taking of hostages

and the savagery of beheadings, it is 2004 all over

again, and week after week there is news of the killing

of foreign hostages in Iraq. When I hear reports about

Israel and Gaza, it is 2005 all over again, and Israel

has launched Operation Summer Rain, immediately

followed by Operation Autumn Clouds. The resulting

death toll in the Gaza Strip was in the hundreds, and

many of the dead were children. Similarly, in the United

States, reports of police brutality against an unarmed

black man take me back to 1999, when 23-year-old

Guinea-born Amadou Diallo was shot 19 times by four

New York City police officers, or to 1991, when Rodney

King was brutally beaten by five Los Angeles police

officers. Both of those incidents caused a tremendous

public outcry, as did this year’s shooting death of

18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri,

with the singular message of “no justice, no peace”.

Do such events indicate an outright regression?

Does the uncomfortable familiarity of some current

world events mean that, despite the changes so many

individuals and organizations have worked to achieve,

we have made little or no progress? I would like to

believe that this is not so. I would like to believe those

events of recent times are merely setbacks that will

motivate us to find more sustainable solutions; they

are just slight reversals on the sinuous path toward true

progress.

Dag Hammarskjöld, who served as the second

Secretary-General of the United Nations, from 1953

until his untimely death in a plane crash in 1961, said,

“The pursuit of peace and progress cannot

end in a few years in either victory or defeat. The

pursuit of peace and progress, with its trials and its

errors, its successes and its setbacks, can never be

relaxed and never abandoned.”

In the course of the past several months, since

the beginning of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa,

I have been reminded of both the importance and

the practicality of those words. True progress relies

on neither victory nor defeat; true progress relies on

persistence, on perseverance. Just last week, on Monday,

in my capacity as the Chair of Economic Community of

West African States (ECOWAS), I travelled to Liberia,

Sierra Leone and Guinea — the three countries that

have been most affected by the outbreak of Ebola. They

are nations that are recovering from conflict. The civil

wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone also adversely affected

Guinea, which shares borders with both countries.

They are nations that were struggling to rebuild their

social and economic infrastructure. Even before the

outbreak of Ebola, they were already operating with

limited resources, an insufficient number of treatment

facilities and a shortage of qualified medical personnel.

So far, there have been 5,843 recorded cases of Ebola,

including 2,803 deaths. The World Health Organization

predicts that if the disease is not brought under control,

the number of cases could easily rise to 20,000 by as

early as November. What makes Ebola so dangerous is

that the virus dares us to compromise the impulses that

exist at the very core of our humanity — our impulse

to comfort one another with love, to care for each other

with the healing power of touch and to maintain the

dignity of our loved ones even in death, with a public

funeral and a properly marked grave.

Ebola is a disease of isolation. It leaves family

members afraid to embrace one another. It leaves

health-care workers afraid to attend to their patients.

It forces the living to abandon the cultural rites of

washing, embalming and burying their dead. Instead,

the dead are zipped into a secure body bag, carried on

a stretcher by makeshift pallbearers in protective wear,

and then tossed into a freshly dug grave.

Just as individuals with Ebola are often shunned and

ostracized by their communities, the initial slowness of

response by the international community in many ways

has left the affected countries to suffer their fate alone

and in isolation. In my travels to those three countries,

although I was aware that some airlines had suspended

flights, I was shocked to find the airports completely

vacant. Ebola is not just a Liberian problem, nor is it a

Sierra Leonean or Guinean problem; it is not just a West

African problem. Ebola is a problem that belongs to the

world because it is a disease that knows no boundaries.

We cannot afford to let fear keep us away or to let

it compromise the very impulses that not only define

but sustain our humanity. We must erase the stigma. To

that end, my country, Ghana, has offered the use of its

capital city, Accra, as a base of operations for activities

geared towards the containment of the disease. I would

like to commend Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and

the Security Council for establishing the United Nations

Mission for Ebola Emergency Response. I would also

like to acknowledge and commend President Barack

Obama and the people of the United States of America

for their enormous commitment to the fight against

Ebola.

Health officials have announced numerous times

that in theory, it is relatively easy to stop the spread

of Ebola because it is transmitted through contact

with bodily fluids. It has been suggested that through

changes in our behaviour and practices the public could

potentially reduce, if not eliminate, their exposure

to the virus. Yet in reality, the Ebola virus was able

to spread so quickly throughout the West African

subregion because of the fluidity of our borders.

The free movement of people, goods and services

throughout the West African subregion is something

that ECOWAS has been promoting for the last several

decades. It allows interaction and increased trade

between our 15 member States. However, without the

proper preventive measures in place, such fluidity can

also enable the free movement of disease, drugs, arms,

human traffickers and terrorists.

Unfortunately. Africa is especially vulnerable to

terrorism because its sheer size and vast terrain offers

myriad places for terrorists to hide and create safe

havens. With over 60 per cent of Africa’s population

under the age of 35 and a significant number living in

extreme poverty, terrorists also have the opportunity to

recruit new members by exploiting the ignorance and

disillusionment of young people who lack the skills,

education and opportunity to find gainful employment.

The proliferation of technology has made even

the most remote areas of the continent accessible

through a phone call or keystroke. What that does is

facilitate communication within terrorist cells and

between terrorist organizations. It would now be far

too simplistic, not to mention myopic, for a nation

to believe that it is dealing with any one terrorist

organization, such as Boko Haram, Al-Shabaab. Ansar

Al-Dine, Al-Qaida, Hizbullah, the Taliban, the Islamic

State in Iraq and the Levant or, recently, the Khorasan

group. Because of the assistance and cooperation that

exist among them, they have in fact become different

tentacles of a single organism. So too must we come

together as one cohesive body, united in our battle

to defend our freedoms and values. We too must

communicate within and among ourselves. We must

cooperate and lend assistance and resources to fight

and conquer the common threat we face.

Since the start of the global recession, economic

growth rates have generally declined and people have,

by and large, become pessimistic about their future.

This month, the Pew Research Center published the

results of a 44-country survey conducted in the spring of

2014 to assess public views of major economic changes

in the world. According to the results, a global median

of 69 per cent are not pleased with the way things are

going in their countries. That includes both advanced

and developing economies. The concerns expressed

cut across a wide spectrum of issues, such as inflation,

unemployment, income inequality and public debt.

My country, Ghana, is no exception. Over the

past year, the public has seen an increase in the cost

of living. Falling commodity prices led not only to a

fall in tax revenues from companies that operate in

Ghana, but they also led to a massive decline in our

export earnings. That contributed to a general sense of

macroeconomic instability and placed a great deal of

pressure on our domestic currency, the cedi.

For the past 22 years, Ghanaians have witnessed

a steady improvement in the circumstances of our

nation. With the return of democracy and the rule of

law, six successful elections and peaceful transitions

of power, Ghana became an example for other African

nations turning towards democracy and constitutional

rule. The stability inspired investor confidence and

increased growth. Soon Ghana was deemed one of the

fastest-growing economies in the world.

That did not make us immune to the economic

challenges that many nations were facing across the

globe — quite the opposite. Instability in the global

commodity markets has a direct bearing on our budgets

and hence on our ability to finance our development.

The global downturn exposed the weaknesses in our

foundation. It alerted us to the need for change, the

need to establish the proper institutions for effective

economic management, institutions that will foster

resilience and an ability to better absorb the blows of

unexpected occurrences or outcomes.

The anxieties and concerns of the Ghanaian public

are understandable. Like so many African countries,

Ghana has been through dark economic times, and our

seemingly changing fortunes, with their uncomfortable

familiarity, brought on a fear of regression. But this

was merely a setback, only a slight reversal. Already,

the home-grown measures of fiscal stabilization that

we have taken are yielding results. Only this month,

Ghana surprised its most ardent critics when it launched

its third Eurobond for an amount of $1 billion. That

successful flotation represents a return of investor

confidence in the prospects of the Ghanaian economy.

That confidence is apparent in the recent rebound of

our domestic currency, the cedi, which in the last two

weeks has appreciated significantly against its major

trading currencies.

Last year when I addressed the Assembly (see

A/68/PV.12), I explained that it is not sympathy we

want in Africa; it is partnership, the ability to stand

on our own feet. In an attempt to establish such a

partnership, we have entered into discussions with the

International Monetary Fund (IMF), an organization

that is no stranger to the process of self-assessment

and the implementation of change in the pursuit of

true progress. Indeed, both Ghana and the IMF have

evolved, and the partnership has the potential to bring

about the sort of transformation that will move Ghana

from the ranks of the low middle-income countries into

a fully fledged middle-income country.

The coming year will mark the twentieth

anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on

Women, which was held in Beijing in 1995. I would

like to note with pride that it will also mark the fortieth

anniversary of Ghana’s establishment of the National

Council on Women and Development, which has since

been renamed the Department of Gender. Ghana has

a long-held commitment to the betterment of women’s

lives, and my Administration has made it a priority to

carry on with that tradition. In fact, much, if not all, of

what we are doing falls directly in line with the areas

of concern enumerated in the Beijing Platform for

Action of the World Conference. My Administration

boasts one of the highest number of women appointed

to public office in the history of Ghana. Seven of our

Cabinet ministers are women, as are the holders of

several senior public service posts, and I hope that the

fact that they are too numerous to list is an indication

that we are reaching towards the ideal.

We have submitted to Parliament an intestate

succession bill, which ensures that if a spouse dies

without having written a will, the surviving spouse will

not be dispossessed of their marital assets. We have also

submitted to Parliament a bill on the property rights of

spouses, which ensures that spouses are entitled to a fair

portion of property acquired during the union. There

area also several other pieces of legislation designed

to offer protection for and empowerment of women,

such as the Domestic Violence Act, the Anti-Human-

Trafficking Act, an affirmative action bill and a gender

policy.

I spoke earlier of isolation. Very few nations have

experienced the sort of exclusion that Cuba has suffered

for the last several decades as a result of the United

States embargo on that country. Ghana reaffirms its

position that this embargo should be lifted. Ghana also

calls for a halt to the establishment of settlements in the

Palestinian territories. We have consistently expressed

our support for a two-State solution to the Israeli-

Palestinian question, with the two nations coexisting

peacefully.

This year the world’s attention has been drawn

to the urgency of addressing the growing problem of

inequality and the threats that it poses to our unrelenting

pursuit of peace. I would also like to draw attention

to the pervasive presence of religious intolerance. At

the root of all of the world’s major religions is the call

for compassion, forgiveness, tolerance, peace and love.

Nevertheless, the use of religious dogma and extremism

as a weapon of violence persists.

In this age of terrorism and political turmoil, of

national, regional and ethnic conflict, it may be tempting

to use the actions of a few to justify prejudice toward

many. It may be tempting to combine the faithful with

the fanatical. But those of us who envision a just and

peaceful world cannot, and should not, yield to those

temptations. Time and time again, history has shown us

that the changing of a world begins with the power that

rests in the hands of the people, ordinary individuals.

Or, in the words of one of the greatest teachers and

leaders of non-violence, Mahatma Gandhi, “You must

be the change you wish to see in the world’’.

Today our Jewish brothers and sisters are

celebrating Rosh Hashanah, their New Year. To them,

I say, “L’shana Tova.” Next week, our Muslim brothers

and sisters will be celebrating Eid al-Adha, the Festival

of the Sacrifice. To them, I say, “Eid Mubarak.” And,

to you, Mr. President, I say, “Many thanks for the

opportunity and for your kind attention”.