“Coups Aren’t Durable Solutions To Africa’s Challenges; They Retard Growth” – President Akufo-Addo

“Our unity and resolve should send a clear message to coup plotters that coups have never been, and will never be durable solutions to Africa’s political, economic and security challenges. Statements condemning coups alone without corresponding action will, however, achieve little or nothing, as witnessed in recent times. This problem requires collective agreement, effective deterrence, bold action and, equally important, adequate preventive measures”.

These were the words of the President of the Republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, at the African Union Peace and Security Council Forum on Unconstitutional Changes of Governments in Africa, held yesterday, at the Kempinski Hotel Accra.

Delivering the keynote address at the event, President Akufo-Addo stated that even though it has taken a long time for a consensus to emerge in Ghana, and, indeed, in Africa, that the democratic form of governance is preferable, “we should not take it for granted that everybody has accepted democracy as the preferred mode of governance”.

According to the President, “there are those who hanker after authoritarian, personal rule, because they claim Africa is underdeveloped and democracy is cumbersome, and we need to get things done in a hurry. There are those who seek short-cuts to office to exercise power without limits, and there are those who have no respect for the free choices of our sovereign people, because they do not accord with their so-called ideological preferences.”

Against this background, reiterated that “we still have some work to do to convince such people that we are all safer under democracies”.