Running on the theme: “Making the United Nations relevant to all people: Global leadership and shared responsibility for peaceful, equitable and sustainable societies”, the Assembly had in attendance majority of the head of states of the United Nations.
Accompanied by the Minister of Foreign Affair and Regional Integration, Shirley Ayorkor Botchway, President Akufo-Addo touched on a number of issues in his address.
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"I wish to extend our heartfelt gratitude to the United Nations Secretariat, led by the Secretary-General, His Excellency António Guterres, and the whole world community for the outpouring of grief and condolences that we received on the passing of Kofi Annan. We were deeply touched that so many world leaders and people took the trouble to come to Accra to bid him farewell."
Nana Addo also touched on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Ghana's readiness in attaining them. "We intend that Ghana will in July 2019, take her turn to present our Voluntary National Review during the ECOSOC High-Level Political Forum, and we will share our successes and challenges as well as opportunities for new and continuing partnerships."
Since Nana Addo was sworn in January 2016, he has championed a Ghana beyond aid agenda. And he said: "We have the necessary sense of enterprise, creativity, innovation and hard work to engineer this transition. Hence, our vision of a Ghana Beyond Aid, indeed, of an Africa Beyond Aid."
Akufo-Addo also spoke about China and its current influence in Africa. "It was at the turn of the 20th century that China’s first railways were built by Western companies, financed by Western loans to a nearly bankrupt Qing Dynasty, and it was under those circumstances that a certain strategic port called Hong Kong was leased for 99 years, and the rest, as the saying goes, is history."
"55% of the work of the Security Council last year had to do with Africa. Unfortunately, this invariably meant peacekeeping and poverty related issues. We no longer want to be the place that requires peacekeepers and poverty fighting NGOs, no matter how noble their motives. Our regional bodies, like ECOWAS, and our continental body, the AU, are making systematic efforts, despite significant handicaps, to bring peace and stability to the entire continent, and, sooner rather than later, they will succeed."