Dr Ishmael Yamson Snr, Chairman of Yamson and Associates, has cautioned political parties against treating Ghana as their possession, saying the people own the country and only entrust its leadership to governments for four-year terms.
Delivering closing remarks at the BRT Extended, under the theme ‘After the Corrections: Building Resilient Economic Pillars for the Next Decade’ in Accra, he said the four-year mandate should be viewed as a period in which political leaders are expected to look after the country on behalf of its citizens, rather than use power to pursue their own interests.
“The people own the country. We only lead the country, sit there for four years to look after,” Dr Yamson said.
He criticised the tendency to wait for elections before citizens demand action from political leaders, noting that Ghanaians often queue to vote every four years while political parties return with new promises and proposals.
Dr Yamson said Ghana needed to break from a cycle in which problems were repeatedly diagnosed and plans developed without sufficient progress in addressing them.
“There’s nothing that has been said today that has not been said before five years, ten years, fifty years ago,” he said, pointing to plans dating as far back as 1975 that contained issues similar to those being discussed today.
He called for a change in Ghana’s culture and mindset, warning that the country could not afford to continue doing things in the same way while the rest of the world advances rapidly.
“We should change the culture and our mindset,” he said. “And we should also remember that we don’t have time as a country, that we’re miles behind.”
Dr Yamson said rapid technological change made it imperative for Ghana to rethink how it equips and prepares its people, particularly in education.
He questioned whether students were making full use of the capabilities of devices such as tablets, rather than limiting them to activities such as social media, arguing that technology should be used to enable people to do “great things”.
He also emphasised the need for Ghana to understand and apply emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence to the economy, noting that AI was already contributing to changes taking place around the world.
“The world is changing very fast. Technology is changing the world so fast,” he said.
Dr Yamson said Ghana could not simply repeat the approaches of the past and expect a different outcome.
“We cannot do the same things we did in the past and accept that Ghana will be a different place,” he said, adding that progress would require deliberate action.
“We have to be intentional about changing Ghana. We have to change our mindset,” he said.
He further urged Ghanaians to recognise the urgency of the task, saying time was not on the country’s side and that efforts to improve the country must be deliberate.
“We have to make things better. We have to be intentional,” Dr Yamson said.
He also commended the speakers at the event for being frank in their assessments and said the assignments given to participants should not be viewed as the responsibility of a select few.
“The best way is to see the truth, that all of us sitting here are in the same position in one way or the other,” he added.
