Building The Nation – A national resolve

Editorial

As long as we do not take a collective responsibility for our nation's failures, we would continue to "run ever faster just to be able to remain at the same place..." We have failed spectacularly in every sphere of our nation's life.

Our universities, regrettably continue to place overwhelming emphasis on rote learning, the medical landscape continues by the day to record needless deaths. We have a sickening sense of hygiene. Our healthcare system is woefully untrusting. Power is notoriously unreliable, our roads are not car worthy. We have bastardized the sanctity of our courts by miscarrying justice instead of offering the Ghanaian the last resort of hope. Our disrespect for the dictates of religion is so high that we engage in wrongdoing with impunity. We have completely lost our sense of national identity and pride.

Until and unless we recognize that it would only take our joint commitment to roll back this situation, we aren't going anywhere with the Ghana project. And to do this we ought to begin to see Ghana not as an abstract notion but a reality that does not require divine intervention. We must see Ghana as requiring the deliberate thought of a national construct.

Secondly, we need to do an attitude adjustment. We have an incredibly poor sense of discipline that too must change if we are to drive our nation's agenda forward. We disrespect time so much that we punish early comers to events with the reward of allowance of time for late comers. Time wait for no man. It is always on the move and it is incumbent on the man who is serious about succeeding to fly with the tide of time as it flows.

We also need to work hard. Not only hard, but also well. We must do our work so well that, in the words of Martin Luther King Jnr, "If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as a Michaelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, 'Here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well." We must give meaning to the dignity in Labour.

Fourthly, we must adopt a code of discipline and inspire all to endeavour to live by. We must love our country and work to protect state property. We must be punctual at work and respect appointments. We must be comradely and forbearing to each other. We must redirect focus on material attainments as the key ingredient to success to seeing improvements in human and social value accomplishments.

Simplicity and Modesty in all that we do matters. If only we shall be simple and modest, none in Ghana shall want in the basic means to life – food, shelter, and clothing; where disease is brought under control and healthcare is extended throughout our borders, and education is pursued to the highest of our potentialities.

We can make it in Ghana. It would not take any spiritual intervention but the physical concerted effort of a national resolve to collectively engage our socio-politico-economic deficit and deal it with a heavy blow.

We can make Ghana work again, just the resolve.