Permit me to extend hearty
congratulations to you, Sir, on your election as
President of the General Assembly at this session. May
I also use this opportunity to express our sincere thanks
to your predecessor, Mr. Joseph Deiss, for the able
manner in which he presided over the sixty-fifth
session.
Ghana joins the rest of the world in welcoming
our sister country, South Sudan, to the family of the
United Nations. It is our fervent hope that South
Sudan, having taken its rightful place in this body, will
grow and prosper. We also want to congratulate the
Secretary-General on his appointment to a second term.
It is a clear manifestation of his excellent performance
during his first term.
It is a long-established fact that United Nations
peacekeeping and peacebuilding activities have
contributed immensely to the Organization’s efforts for
the maintenance of international peace and security
over the years. We observe, however, that this activity
continues to take on complex dimensions that require
long-term planning and urgent reforms in order to
enable the United Nations to tackle the challenges that
crop up.
It is in this connection that Ghana reaffirms its
support for the ongoing reform agenda being
undertaken by the United Nations in consultation with
the troop- and police-contributing countries. However,
we do want to emphasize that regular tripartite
consultations are needed among the United Nations,
the Secretariat, the Security Council and the troop- and
police-contributing countries.
As one of the top contributors of police and
troops to United Nations activities, Ghana remains
unwavering in its commitment to the ideals and
objectives of the United Nations. Accordingly, I want
to assure Members that as long as financial, human and
material capacities exist at the national level, Ghana
will continue to provide troops and police personnel
for United Nations operations.
But it is important that the burden and costs to
the United Nations of these activities be equitably
shared among Member States. We think that countries
such as Ghana that provide troops and police personnel
for these operations must be financially supported by
donor countries in a timely manner. We are aware of
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the financial constraints existing at all national levels,
but we want to encourage Member States to meet their
obligations to the United Nations so that the
Organization can execute its mandate.
Allow me to pay tribute to all United Nations
personnel — including those from my own country,
Ghana — who in the course of the year made the
ultimate sacrifice while on United Nations
peacekeeping missions. May their souls rest in peace
and their sacrifice be cherished and remembered.
Another issue that we are following with keen
interest is the proposed arms trade treaty. Ghana fully
supports this and thinks it is necessary. Hence our
satisfaction thus far with the outcomes of the meetings
of the Preparatory Committee for the United Nations
Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty held in New
York last year and in February and March this year.
As a nation, we consider a strong and effective
arms trade treaty to be an indispensable step in
preventing the flow of arms to destinations where they
can cause mayhem and wreak havoc by fuelling
conflicts that may in turn undermine national and
regional peace, security and development, or
exacerbate tensions that in the long run may create
situations that need the deployment of United Nations
peacekeepers.
For developing countries such as Ghana, the
illicit proliferation of small arms and light weapons
and other conventional weaponry continues to pose a
serious threat to our national security and to our
socio-economic and political stability, given the
linkage to other crimes such as terrorism, organized
crime, drug trading and indeed human trafficking,
among others. It is therefore imperative that the
remaining meetings of the arms trade treaty
Preparatory Committee produce proposals that would
close the loopholes that allow the flow of these
weapons from legitimate to illicit markets.
The United Nations reached a significant
milestone with the launch of UN-Women — the United
Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the
Empowerment of Women. It is critical as member
States of the international community that we break
gender stereotypes, which after all are the root cause of
the myriad of gender-inequality challenges facing us
throughout the world. Ghana’s efforts are focused on
addressing gender imbalances and misconceptions and
on improving the living conditions of women and girls,
bearing in mind that in solving the gender issue we
would be taking concrete steps towards the attainment
of a majority of the Millennium Development Goals. It
is our expectation that the objectives of UN-Women
will be met.
On the occasion of the High-level Meeting to
commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Durban
Declaration and Programme of Action, Ghana
recognizes the progress so far made in this area by the
opportunity given to Member States to reaffirm and
strengthen their political commitment to the prevention
of and fight against racism and racial discrimination in
all its forms. We are confident that the effective
implementation of the outcome policy (see resolution
66/3) will indeed ensure the enjoyment of human rights
and fundamental freedoms by all, including the victims
of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and
related intolerance, in all societies.
It is noteworthy that the High-level Meeting of
the General Assembly on the Prevention and Control of
Non-communicable Diseases focused on the developmental
drawbacks and socio-economic impact on developing
countries where the relevant facilities are not available.
Indeed, we are of the opinion that the effective
prevention and control of non-communicable diseases
not only helps to reduce poverty but also decreases
health-care costs, thereby improving productivity and
ultimately helping with rapid economic development.
Efforts in Ghana to improve the health-care
system include the completion of the health-care
infrastructure in several parts of the country, the
scaling-up of the National Ambulance Service to cover
all districts and the training of emergency medical
technicians. We have re-engineered our policies in
order to give more meaning to health-care delivery.
Ghana recognizes and appreciates the
contribution of youth to nation-building and the growth
and sustenance of our democracy. We believe that the
adoption of the political declaration urging Member
States to adopt comprehensive plans and measures to
give meaning to youth development is commendable,
especially since this is the International Year of Youth.
In Ghana we are implementing policies that are
intended to situate young men and women in the centre
of nation-building.
One of the main reasons for our relentless fight
against drug trafficking is to ensure that we secure the
future of our young men and women, who, after all,
3 11-51185
will be the future leaders of our dear nations. As we
continue to invest heavily in our youth by expanding
educational opportunities and making it possible for
the disadvantaged to have access to formal schooling,
we believe we are laying the right foundation. The
provision of free school uniforms, free exercise books
and the elimination of more than one thousand schools
under trees, turning them into brick-and-mortar
structures, should be ample evidence of our
determination to brighten the future of youth. Certainly
Ghana’s oil and gas find should present us with a
greater opportunity to create the conditions under
which we will be able to create more jobs to solve
youth unemployment in our country.
Climate change is the defining human
development challenge of the twenty-first century and
one of the greatest threats to sustainable development
in Africa. Although as a continent we contribute only
4 per cent of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions, we
are the most vulnerable when it comes to climate
change. Therefore urgent and concerted action is
needed to enable us to maximize the opportunity that
climate change offers.
We believe that with the right investments in
technology, institutions and infrastructure by the
international community and nation-States, we will be
able to unleash the potential of agriculture, harness the
maximum benefit from water resources, expand access
to modern energy sources, fight diseases and conserve
tropical forests.
As we move closer to the climate change
negotiations scheduled for Durban, South Africa, it is
our expectation that the critical political questions that
could not be answered during the United Nations
Climate Change Conference at Cancún will be
addressed. With regard to mitigation, we believe that
we need political commitment, a high sense of
flexibility and strong leadership to ensure that at the
Durban Conference the second round of commitments
under the Kyoto Protocol will be addressed or some
transitional arrangement made.
Again with regard to mitigation, we believe that
all pledged commitments and actions should be
quantified, monitored and verified by the international
community. We commend the obvious progress made
in the design of the institutions of adaptation, such as
the Green Climate Fund. What remains to be done is to
determine the sources of funding for the Fund and also
to empower the Conference of Parties to the United
Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to
have control over the Green Climate Fund.
On the political and security fronts, Ghana
notices a paradigm shift, or at least a shift in emphasis,
from national security to human security. We agree that
interventions targeted on human security will
eventually define our national security. We are
therefore implementing measures that will help us
make this concept take form through the adoption of
the necessary legislative measures, institutions and
reforms. We are taking steps to expand our adherence
to the rule of law, the promotion of transparency and
good governance, the maintenance of the independence
and integrity of the judiciary, and the promotion of a
free media. We also subscribe to the global norm of the
responsibility to protect, and we promise to work hand
in glove with member countries, the United Nations
and others to achieve this.
A little over a year from now Ghana will be going
to the polls to elect a President and Members of
Parliament for another four years. To ensure that the
elections are free, fair, transparent and credible, our
Electoral Commission — which has successfully organized
the last three elections, since the year 2000 — has put in
place the necessary measures to enable Ghanaians to
make their choices in a free atmosphere. Our
democratic credentials stand tall, and we would not
want anything to affect the standard that we have
achieved.
Just as the United Nations and the rest of the
international community kept an eye on the 2008
elections in Ghana, I should like to invite you,
Mr. President, and all others to come and do the same
in connection with the 2012 elections. We want to
make sure that people are given the right to vote and
choose their own leaders, instead of having leaders
imposed on them or come in through unauthorized
means.
Finally, I wish to reaffirm Ghana’s total
commitment to the aims, objectives and ideals of the
United Nations. I also want to advocate that all
Member States muster the necessary political will to
ensure that the United Nations functions more
effectively.