Final decision to ease restrictions to be reached on Friday - Senior Minister

Senior Minister, Yaw Osafo-Maafo, has revealed that final talks on how Ghana should lift coronavirus restrictions will round off on Friday, May 29, 2020.

Friday’s meeting, according to the Senior Minister, will pool the views of key stakeholders in a bid to agree on the best way to ease the restrictions and bring economic and social life to normalcy.

“Almost all the identified groups who matter in this light have been consulted,” he said Tuesday, May 26, 2020, during a press briefing held at the behest of the Information Ministry to give updates on the coronavirus situation in the country and other related pressing matters.

The churches, he revealed, have been a key part of the discussion.

“If the country must be going on economically, the country must be socially cohesive and, therefore, we have to put all the various measures in place to ensure that we go about our normal work very well and also taking into consideration the various measures to ensure control over the virus,” Mr. Osafo-Maafo stated.

President Nana Akufo-Addo earlier this month extended the ban on public gathering, including religious activities, festivals and funerals till the end of May.

Delivering his ninth address to the nation on measures taken to combat the spread of Coronavirus, Akufo-Addo said the closure of schools and ban on public gatherings had created a lot of inconvenience for many Ghanaians but "we have no option but to stay the course.

Churches have been among the groups pushing for the easing of the restrictions.

As of Tuesday, May 26, 2020, Ghana's coronavirus case count stands at 6,964 with 32 deaths and 2,097 recoveries.