Ghana Publishing to begin security printing
The Ghana Publishing Company is to begin security printing in the country.
According to the Minister of Information, Mr Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, the Cabinet had given approval to the company to carry out the exercise.
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“We will be working to roll out a road map on how the company will commence security printing, not just for the profitability expected to be associated with it but, more importantly, to deal with the necessary security protocols of state documents that it publishes,” he said.
Mr Nkrumah said this when he inaugurated a new production unit of the company, also known as the Assembly Press, in Accra yesterday.
The unit has five speedmaster colour machines, known in the printing industry as the Perfect Binder, a two-colour speedmaster machine and a cutting-edge folding machine.
They were procured from the company’s internally generated funds.
Security printing deals with the printing of items such as banknotes, cheques, passports, tamper-evident labels, security tapes, product authentication, stock certificates, postage stamps and identity cards.
It combines various features such as holograms, codes, fine line security patterns, variable line thickness, ghost watermarks and microtext.
Fake documentations
“In today’s growing media enterprise, there are all kinds of fake documents that people publish, and if you are the official state publisher, the documents that you print must have the necessary security features and we are excited that we have secured that Cabinet approval for you,” the minister said.
He congratulated the management and staff of the company on their hard work and the able manner they had worked for the transformation of the company, with the government’s support.
“The result of this exercise is what we are witnessing, since 2017. Physically, your premises has seen an impressive transformation. Even your working space and the logistics with which you work have seen a boost and I am sure you all feel a lot more comfortable working in this new environment,” Mr Nkrumah said.
Working conditions
“I am informed that your working conditions are gradually improving, so that you can also draw more value from the improved fortunes of the organisation. Your finances as an organisation have also significantly improved and, indeed, your profit between 2016 and 2017 has quadrupled,” he added.
Mr Nkrumah said what was happening at the company fitted into the bigger picture of re-organising institutions under the Ministry of Information, which included the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, the Ghana News Agency, the Information Services Department, as well as the New Times Corporation.
“Our expectation is that now that you have quicker turnaround times and world-class printing and packaging machines, you can compete with all other players on the market,” he said.
Past state
The Managing Director of the company, Mr David Boateng Asante, told the Daily Graphic that “We have acquired two new digital printing machines. We are in the process of completing all the contracts in the district assembly elections the Electoral Commission has given to us. This is a positive development in the last three weeks”.
The acting Director-General of the State Interests and Governance Authority (SIGA), Mr Stephen Asamoah-Boateng, commended the company for its impressive transformation.