Make education a priority to reduce poverty – Nduom

The founder of the Progressive People’s Party (PPP) Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom says unless deliberate investments are made to target higher literacy across all levels of the populations of Ghana, the country will continue to suffer the problems of underdevelopment.

According to Dr. Nduom, nowhere in the world has development occurred without higher levels of literacy for every member of that country, stating that only education can lift the country from economic dependency to economic independence.

He, therefore, urged Ghanaians to demand from elected officials to make the right and necessary investments in the education of Ghanaians, stating it is only through education that inhabitants from rural communities can change their economic status from poor to well to do.

He asked: “So if I go to Sampa and I want to put a manufacturing company there, I go to Hamile and I want to put a manufacturing company there who am I going to employ there if most of the people haven’t gone pass basic education?’’

He stressed that without vigorously educating the rural folks, nobody will plan to establish factories in those parts of the country to boost the local economy there.

“If [a businessman] is not from Ghana and they are coming from the US, UK or Japan or anywhere else will they even think about [bringing] jobs to Sampa or Hameli or Gemini in the Volta region or any of those places, absolutely not. They will want to come to Accra, Tema or maybe to Kumasi. Even in the oil and gas [found in the Western Region] their offices are in Accra,” Nduom said while addressing students of the Catholic University College in Sunyani in the Brong Ahafo region.

Dr. Nduom says the lack of human resources for folks in the countryside has hampered his attempts at employing indigenous people to fill positions at local GN Bank branches across the country. He further expressed the hope to increase the number of GN bank branches across the country from the current 245 to 300 branches before the end of this year.