Re Ghana is a vibrant country with huge potential

– UK High Commissioner

by Kojo Tamakloe





This was the headline a few days ago. Of course there was a mixed review with some being negative and others seeing it as positive . I viewed it as a challenge . He is a diplomat and is used to couching his language as such . He was sending a message , coded as usual , “you are complaining and pointing fingers but the solutions lie within your ambit.” Just stop , take a look and think . Just think , why do we have so much and write about it but we are struggling? Why are we “poor” ?In his speech he used the word “ potential” . You see for those of us who studied science before branching into other fields , the word potential carries a lot of meanings . A stone on top of a high mountain has potential energy and when it falls gets transformed into kinetic energy . A new born child has potential that with the correct training can be transformed into useful person . A bushy piece of land can be transformed into a food producing one . So let us look at potential


Potential generally refers to a currently unrealized ability. The term is used in a wide variety of fields, from physics to the social sciences to indicate things that are POSSIBLE . He did not mention the areas or potential though . But where does Ghana have potential and it is said to be HUGE ?.


Ghanaians write about the resources they have , cocoa, gold, oil , climate, soil, the rivers, coastline, ocean, forests, sunlight, wind , arable lands timber, industrial diamonds, bauxite, manganese, fish, rubber, hydropower, petroleum, silver, salt, limestone but above all human resource . So why are we “poor” and why do we complain? The answer I believe is the lack of transformational ability which is why human resource becomes an important factor .We leave most idle


What is human resource? “ Human resources is the set of individuals who make up the workforce of an organization, business sector, or economy. "Human capital" is sometimes used “ I have written about a well known person by way of Ace Ankomah and quoted from a speech to a graduating class . Here again are some snippets ...





“Brains Develop A Nation, Not Resources” Ace goes on


“Alvin Toffler writes that “the illiterates of the 21st Century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot LEARN, UNLEARN AND RE-LEARN.” That is what this institution is supposed to turn you into: not just a degree holder, but a person with the ability to learn, unlearn and learn again. It is all about the mind. That is why the late Robert Nesta Marley (more popularly known as “Bob Marley”) famously sang that “none but ourselves can free our own minds.” You are what you think you are. If you think that you are a grasshopper, you are, but if you think that you are an achiever and a giant, that is exactly what you are. It is said in the Good Book, again, that “as a man thinks in his heart, so is he.” It is that thinking, the developed brain, that will develop this nation. :RESOURCES ARE NOT, BUT BECOME”. ( The last Italics are mine). President Mahama says ask what it can be used for or enhanced . Are we listening , or we just want to drown him out ?

“Resources are not but are becoming “ In wealth creation for those who studied economics, 4 factors are need Enterprise, Land, Capital and labor . When these factors are combined in an efficient manner wealth is the product . On Friday July 18th 2014 , this headline screamed at me





“Ghana imports vegetables too!” and goes on


Ghana, a net exporter of food items some few years back, is now a net importer of food items that can easily be produced in the country.





Most of the daily consumables – such as orange, onion, tomato, plantain, toothpick, carrot, garlic, garden egg, okro, cabbage, ginger, and ‘kontomire’ – are imported into the country. It costs $15m in foreign exchange and we cry about the cedi falling? Guys we are not talking about rice and poultry that DRAIN $1bn dollars a year in foreign currency . And we demonstrate against government , saying we are suffering? Am I missing something? It is the rainy season and what are we doing ?We are marching as we were taught to recite in Class1. Busia did it so we must do it too . Then it goes on


“ Ironically, some of these countries are near-desert conditions and yet they are the ones that are now feeding Ghana, a country blessed with arable lands. The importation has become so pervasive that the External Trade Statistics of Ghana show that large sums of money are spent each year on importing vegetables.”Does government or the president have to grow these for us too?

It was refreshing to then read on Sunday July 20th, an article by one, Hardi this, under change of mindset “ in a demo-crazy ,everyone can make some noise; it could be from an intellectual, tribal, economical or empty-barrel point of view. It almost seems like we are in political age, and that we have marginalized information technology and education into the background” Is it by sitting behind a desk and pushing pen that makes you educated ? . But is democracy the one at fault ? I researched further and found what one Alfred Lamptey , a KNUST lecturer had written sometime ago


“Ghana is a country blessed with all natural resources in the like of gold,


diamond, bauxite. And now oil. One of the major problems for underdevelopment


in Ghana can be attributed to the inadequate of human resources in the country


and other resources. When i say resources i mean to say not only the human


resources but also the other resources (financial resources, materials required,


machineries involved etc.) that are needed to accomplish a task or an objective.


Human resources here describe the individuals who comprise the workforce of the


country, Management is a process that involves planning, managing resources to


accomplish the set objectives, and measuring the results got. Managing of human

resource in the country can be done by first pointing out the main causes of


inadequate human resources in the country.


Some of the causes of inadequate of human resources are: lack or inadequate


practical education in the sciences and other technical subjects, the inadequate


human resource in the country is because of the inadequate practical training


given to both students and workers of science, technical and other aspect of


studies. Students in both the tertiary and high schools lack the practical


aspect of what they study.” Mr Lampey’s assertion reminded me of a time I was teaching workers and they came to class with a spanner and a screw driver , placed it on my rickety table and waited. I came in innocently took the screw driver and started screwing in the protruding screws to make the table more stable . They clapped in amazement .They thought I could not use them . We have economists who did not know mathematics and so memorized graphs to pass exams and agriculturists who knew the texture of the soil from text books but not in reality .





Management is a process that involves setting objectives, planning, acquiring and managing resources to accomplish the set objectives, and measuring the results got and the comparing them against the targets . So why do we have to bring in foreign expertise all the time IMF, World bank, EU, Chinese, Swedes, Germans nearly 60 years after independence ? Without them we have no Black star Line, Airways, derelict railways, under performing, TOR, STC,VRA , filthy cities and town, unplanned environment, inefficient tax collection , inefficient procurement system, inefficient judicial system and all the industries left to rot that no one can revive ,with scandals of SADA, GYEEDA . Then we cannot even maintain what we have, always being reactive , like roads, bridges, buildings . Then we talk about jealousy and envy when we all go to the pit latrines and have no lights nor water and have a legacy of Sodom & Gomorrah? Is that not why we have dum sor , dumsor and water shortage ? The equipments were getting old and the population growing but we were sleeping no we neither maintained , replaced nor upgraded

Education “the act or process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge, developing the powers of reasoning and judgment, and generally of preparing oneself or others intellectually for mature life. ‘The story goes of a Native American Chief who was asked to give some people for education. He replied the ones who gave you came back and could not hunt , nor cultivate, nor listen to the ancestral spirits. In other words they were unsuitable for their way of life . But is that not what our education has been doing all this time?


If so much depends on the human resource and its development what are we doing to get the correct type of education? What in our curriculums will make a difference? Is it by making our children positive minded and accepting themselves and their abilities that matter?. Why compare yourself with others? So, 1. positive thinking comes from a positive environment . Some researchers call for reading positive books to babies as young as 3 months (catch them young) 2. Relevance of our education to our environment . That means let us put emphasis on Agriculture, technical, vocational , mathematics, science and technology 3. Building leadership and entrepreneuralship . Leaders have vision and should not be judged from where they come from. “ God has no favorites” . So let us not hesitate to teach about people like Nkrumahs and the obstacles they had to surmount to get to where they got to , Busia, working and studying(those were days of slow coach mail), Nelson Mandela and Oliver Tambo. You need to go and see where they started life from Qunu village and Port St Johns in the former Transkei. Prof alloteys, Rawlingses, Lumubas, Appentengs , Menkas, Baahs , Steve Jobs, Martin Luthers, Einstein, Curries, Obamas


Finally Let us together fight corruption . When we demonstrate it should start from the ground and be no respecter of persons . Do not forget, State money is “your money” . Let us start a new revolution from the ground up. What can we produce and use in our communities and the surplus sell to create wealth








Forward ever , backward never





The writer Kojo Tamakloe is a Pan Africanist who believes that it is only African unity that is a solution to its underdevelopment