Cardinal Turkson calls for national IDs
Mar 04, 2006
The Archbishop of Cape Coast, Peter Cardinal Appiah Turkson, on Friday called on the government to fulfill its promise to provide all Ghanaian citizens with identity cards and to tackle it as one of its major projects in the coming year.
(myjoyonline.com, Dec 30 2005) He said the identity cards were a "basic instrument for democracy", since it would give the government the needed statistics on the number of people it has to deal with.
Cardinal Turkson, made the call in his New Year message through the GNA at Cape Coast, said it was "unfortunate" that at present, there were no proper statistics on the number of people on retirement, children born, or of people in the working age.
He however, cautioned that Ghanaians should not see the provision of the ID cards as a move to sack aliens, but as a way of giving Ghanaians the requisite recognition, as well as enable the government to do effective planning.
According to the Cardinal, the provision of ID cards "would be unforgettable legacy" the government would leave for the people, stressing that possessing voter ID cards and Passports, was not enough to give Ghanaians the needed recognition in the intentional world.
Cardinal Turkson acknowledged the peaceful manner in which both the NPP and NDC conducted their congresses, and said this was an indication that the nation was "now maturing in its democracy", and urged the leaders of the various political parties do their campaigns devoid of rancor, and tribalism and ensure that there was total freedom of _expression.
The Archbishop, however observed that there was the need "for a third strong political party in the country to enable people to make other choices instead having to either go for NDC or NPP"
"Our democracy is maturing and we need other alternatives to choose from" he stressed.
Touching on the economy, Cardinal Turkson thanked the country's development partners for their support by either cancelling her debts or providing loans and grants and tasked the government to make good use of such support to change the social and economic orbit of the country.
He was hopeful that the "economic favours" received by the government would become "motors" to push the country into a new orbit for a better economy, adding that efforts towards a single digit inflation, should be translated into improving the lives of the people, since there was still poverty in many homes, in spite of the numerous international interventions.
He said although the provision of projects, like KVIPs, schools and hospitals were all good for the people, a lot more should done to enable them have decent accommodation, potable water and good meals, since these were basic things that life depended on.
On the fight against HIV/AIDS, he thanked the Ghana AIDS Commission and other concerned organisations for their efforts and urged that the ministry of health to find ways of decentralizing the provision of anti-retroviral drugs to all hospitals, and not to restrict their dispensing to only Korle-Bu and Komfo-Anokye hospitals, as people have to travel long distances to get treated.
Touching on the role of the church, the Cardinal said the church would continue to play its partnership role effectively and would commit itself to making human life fulfilling and wished all Ghanaians a more promising year.
Cardinal Turkson calls for national IDs