Ghana’s National Protection Policy and
Sustainable Development
By Mawutodzi Kodzo Abissath
A
traditional wisdom in African proverb reminds us that: “Complaints do not
eliminate poverty.”
Cambridge
Dictionary defines Policy as “a
set of ideas or a plan of what to do in particular situations that has been
agreed to officially by a group of people, a business organization, a
government, or a political party.”
If the
above-quoted definition of Policy is anything to go by, then Ghana, as a nation
has no problem at all. Should we compile all policy documents formulated by
various Governments of Ghana since independence, even the University of
California Library, which is said to be the largest in the world, cannot
contain them.
Within
the last three months alone, Government has launched some of the most profound
policies that, if implemented to the letter, the country will be dancing to the
“Blue Haven”. Two of the said policies that readily come to mind are the
National Migration Policy, launched by the Ministry of the Interior in April,
and the Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) Broadcasting Policy, by the
Ministry of Communications in May this year.
The Ghanaian Times has
dutifully and faithfully published full page features on some of the national policies written by this author and
others as part of their public education and awareness creation for the benefit
of the citizenry. In their views, if the people for whom such policies are made
are not aware of them, then it is better they were not formulated at all in the
first place.
The
purpose of this article is to inform the general public, especially those who
are yet know about the launch of another crucial policy, which aims at ensuring
social protection of the people of Ghana. The target beneficiaries of this
policy are some of the most vulnerable in our society. They include women,
children, and people with disabilities, the aged, the deprived, the maginalised
and our most unfortunate grandmothers in some parts of our country.
These are
hardworking women who are not only discriminated against, but are also baptised
and stigmatised as witches for no apparent reasons. What is their crime? That
they are old ladies who are going through some biological or physiological
changes at a certain stage of their lives? For that matter they must be
rejected by their own relatives and abandoned in some camps to face the
vicissitudes of life?
Please can somebody tell those intolerant
relatives that we are in the 21st century Ghana? The other day I saw
on television, some of these noble but miserable old ladies insisting that they
preferred staying in the witch camps to going back to their relatives to be
lynched. What a pity. A traditional adage has it that “when I look after you to
grow your teeth, you must also look after me to drop my teeth.” But look at how
society is treating these so-called witches. We rarely see the same treatment
being meted out to wizards. Why? It is some of the plights of such people that
the Social Protection Policy seeks to address.
It was Hon. Rashid Pelpuo, Minister of State,
Private-Public Partnership, who officially launched the policy document on
behalf of the President of the Republic of Ghana, John Dramani Mahama, on Monday, 13 June this year, here in Accra. He told the nation that the policy would
propel Ghana to achieving the first Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) of
ending poverty in all its forms. He added that the formulation of the Social
Protection Policy underscored government’s commitment to building a prosperous
and equitable society.
But is it
possible to end poverty “in all its forms” in reality? There is poverty in
America. Nevertheless, the fact that a policy has been formulated to enable
citizens to realise their basic right and participate in socio-economic life is
commendable. According to Hon. Pelpuo, the policy would further propel Ghana to
achieving a substantive inclusion of the poor and vulnerable equitable
distribution of national “kenkey”. This is laudable indeed!
Ghana’s Minister for Gender, Children
and Social Protection (MoGCSP), Mrs. Nana Oye Lithur, who championed the
formulation of the National Social Protection Policy, has opined that this
was the first time the government and the people
of Ghana had initiated a holistic approach to the protection of the most
vulnerable in Ghanaian society.
She pointed out that her ministry’s
vision is to aspire to mitigate and reduce vulnerabilities, close the
inequality gap and to ensure total inclusion of all Ghanaians in the social
protection basket of the nation. Mrs.
Lithur said the National Gender Policy, which had also been printed in Braille,
would also deliver a well co-ordinated, inter-sectoral social protection system
that would enable people to live in dignity through income support, livelihood
empowerment and improved access to basic services. Is it not fantastic?
According to the Minister, the policy
was anchored on Ghana’s National
Development Planning framework and drew from the Ghana Shared Growth and
Development Agenda (GSGDA II 2014-2017), and the Co-ordinated Programme of
Economic and Social Development Policies (2014-2020) as well as a range of
sectoral policies and programmes.
She explained that technical and
operational co-ordination of social protection initiatives rested with MoGCSP,
supported by the Social Protection Sector Working Group (SPSWG) and the Social
Protection Inter-sectoral Technical Committee (SPISTC). It is hoped that such a
magnificent policy would not be a still-born baby from the womb to the tomb,
but would be nurtured and be put into practical implementation to achieve the
intended goals and objectives.
For the purpose of this article, it is
relevant to highlight some of the goals and objectives as related in the Policy
Brief document for the benefit of Ghanaians:
one of the goals is to promote the well-being of Ghanaians through “an
integrated platform of effective social assistance, and financial access to
social services.”
With regard to objectives, which can be
said to specific, measurable, achievable and time bound, it stipulated that
“within the next one and a half decades (2016-2031), it is envisioned that
through social protection programmes, poverty would be reduced by half through
increased and improved effective and efficient social assistance for poor and
vulnerable Ghanaians.”
Another objective that caught my fancy
is that, with the coming into being of this policy, “employment opportunities
would have been considerably enhanced through the promotion of productive
inclusion and decent work to sustain families and communities.” Wompe woyia wopeden? To wit: If you
don’t like this what do you want?
In fact, there are some specific
objectives or goals technically referred to in the Policy Brief document as
“The Social Protection Floor”. They include, “Access to basic essential health
care for all, with particular attention to maternal health; Minimum income
security to access the basic needs of life for children; Minimum income
security for people of working age; and finally, Minimum income security for
older persons…”
How do we, as a nation, ensure that the
lofty goals and objectives of this policy are implemented to the fullest?
Again, it is reassuring that the document itself made provision for some
element in the policy dubbed “Ghana’s Social Protections Obligations.”
For an article of this nature, I wish
to state the first paragraph of the said Protection Obligations for record
purposes: “The National Social Protection Policy is guided by the Directive
Principles of State Policy of the Fourth Republican Constitution. It seeks to
provide just and reasonable access of all people in Ghana to public facilities
and services and promote respect for fundamental human rights and freedoms…”
No further comments!
The writer works with Information Services Department (ISD)
in Accra abissath@gmail.com
