'Ghana needs concerted efforts to maintain national peace'

Wusorkrom (C/R), Jan. 27, - The United Nations Association - Ghana (UNA), in collaboration with the Global Peace Mission (GPM), has marked the International Day in memory of the Holocaust victims with a call for concerted efforts to maintain national peace.

In 2005, a UN General Assembly Resolution designated January 27 as an annual event in memory of the six million Jews in Europe and North Africa as well as millions of other marginalised groups who suffered the systematic murder by Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany.

Speaking at the Commemoration Durbar at Wusorkrom in the Abura Aseibu Kwamankese District of the Central Region, Bishop Peter Sackey, the President of the UNA, urged Ghanaians to jealously guard the peace that the country was enjoying.

It was on the theme: "Importance of Peace, Just and Inclusive Societies: Implementing the Sustainable Development Goal 16 at the Local and National Level".

He said total peace in the society promoted national cohesion, which in turn attracted and maintained investors to stimulate socio-economic growth.

Bishop Sackey said the Holocaust was not just something that happened and went away but could easily happen again if stringent measures were not adopted to effectively reduce the growing levels of inequalities and discrimination.

He, therefore, stressed the need for national leaders to guard against demeaning traits such as ethnicity, gender imbalances, racial discrimination, political persecutions, injustices and corruption.

He pointed out that during the Holocaust, the Jews fell victim to propaganda, which appeared they were inferior human beings who deserved less respect than others and stressed the need to disregard such tendencies.

Giving examples to buttress his explanation, Bishop Sackey indicated that a similar situation happened in Rwanda, Cambodia and Darfur where members of a particular ethnic group were targeted for extermination by others, because they had been made to appear inferior and unwanted.

Dr Samuel Ato Duncan, the President of GPM, said the predicaments and woes of the African were as a result of the selfishness and greed of its leaders who had failed to utilise the numerous rich resources to the betterment of the people.

He said it was regrettable that Africans were faced with poverty, corruption, deprivation and its attendant preventable diseases including  HIV/AIDS, malaria, cholera and typhoid coupled with the slow pace of economic development.

Dr Duncan challenged African leaders to strive towards putting in place measures that would not only improve the lot of the people but would ensure good governance at all times.

Daasebre Kwabu Ewusi VII, the President of Abeadze Dominase Traditional Council, and Vice President of the National House of Chiefs, stressed the need for African culture and traditions to be strengthened to sustain national peace.

GNA