Former Minister of Environment, Science and Technology, Professor Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, has called for a long-term national development plan that will remain in force even when there is a change in government.

He said Ghana’s development efforts have often been affected by changes in political leadership, with successive administrations introducing new programmes instead of building on existing long-term plans.

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Speaking in an interview on Channel One TV on Wednesday, September 16, 2026, Professor Frimpong-Boateng said the country needed to agree on a clear development direction that would be followed by successive governments.

“I don’t see any clear picture being laid out by the politicians,” he said.

According to him, Ghana has previously had long-term development frameworks but failed to maintain them after political changes. He cited the Seven-Year Development Plan introduced under Ghana’s first President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, as one such example.

“For example, we abandoned Kwame Nkrumah’s Seven-Year Development Plan. We abandoned it and now replace it with One-District-One-Factory, One-Village-One-Dam, Nkoko Nkitinkiti, and Big Push and all that. These are not sustainable things.”

Professor Frimpong-Boateng said major national programmes should not depend on the government or political party that introduced them, stressing that a long-term plan should be respected by successive administrations.

“There must be a solid plan that we can all follow, long-term, something that the government, even your own party, will maintain. But some of them, even the next government from the same party, will be rejected,” he said.

The former minister therefore called for a national consensus on Ghana’s development priorities, arguing that such an approach would help protect major policies and programmes from being abandoned whenever political power changes hands.

He said the lack of continuity has left Ghana moving from one development initiative to another without establishing a clear and lasting direction for the country.

“We are at a roundabout. We are dancing around, driving around a roundabout for years. We’ve gone past the crossroads. We’ve come to a point where we have to decide whether to go to the left or to the right, or maybe forward,” he said.

ANAS/MA

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