Wean country off dependence on development partners — Dr Boakye
The President of the Ghana Institution of Engineers (GhIE), Dr Kwame Boakye, has urged the government to wean the country off dependence on the 'development partners' for financial support.
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He said it was demeaning that "we cannot balance our national budget without their contribution, run our public institutions without their financial support and even elections which lie at the core of exercising our franchise must be partially funded by these partners."
Delivering the 47th Presidential Address of the GhIE in Accra, Dr Boakye expressed worry that over time Ghana had become a beggar nation which was addicted to handouts.
"As a Gold Coast baby who was exposed to the era of 'Lift high the flag of Ghana', I find it distressing that, increasingly, we are unable to execute without the support of our so-called development partners," he said.
The lecture, which traced Ghana's socio-economic development trajectory, vis-a-vis the South East Asian countries such as Korea, Singapore and Taiwan with whom Ghana began the journey of nationhood, was on the theme: "Ghana must embrace Science, Technology, Engineering and Innovation to achieve sustainable development."
National retrospection
Dr Boakye said Ghana’s continued dependence on the development partners should be of great concern to its people because the practice affected the very essence of the country’s sovereignty.
"This calls for national retrospection. If we wonder why the respect others have for us is diminishing, we need look no further.
"What would you think of relatives or friends who cannot run their households without constantly resorting to you for assistance?" he asked.
Science and Technology
Dr Boakye said the country paid much lip-service to leveraging Science, Technology, Engineering and Innovation (STEI) for national development.
Besides, he said there was a lack of innovation infrastructure that could facilitate industrial innovation and research.
For instance, he said the country allocated only 0.3 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) to research, noting that that allocation was 30 years after the Lagos Plan of
Action and the reaffirmation in 2006 by African Heads of State pledging to commit one per cent of GDP to research in the region.
"By contrast, some of our counterparts in South East Asia had spent about two per cent of GDP on STEI," he said.
National development
Dr Boakye called for the integration of STEI into national development strategies to achieve national objectives for poverty reduction, competitiveness of enterprises, sustainable environmental management and industrial growth.
That, he said, must be a tenet of the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC) and be captured in political party manifestos.
He stressed the need for the country to set a goal to reach the target of allocating one per cent of GDP to STEI in two years, with an increase to 20 per cent per year subsequently.
He again advocated the creation of a designated ministry whose mission was to make the nation competitive in STEI to accelerate the development process.
