Accra. Jan. 30, - Ghana would
soon construct an iconic tower at the Centre of the World in Tema in the
Greater Accra Region as a way of attracting tourists to the country and rake-in
more revenue for the State.
The iconic tower would uniquely
identify Ghana, which would be similar to that of the Liberty Statue in New
York, USA, the Eiffel Tower in France and the Guddingburg Tower in Germany.
Madam Catherine Ablema Afeku, the
Minister of Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts, made the disclosure when she
took her turn at the Meet-the-Press Series in Accra.
She said the Ministry would
collaborate with the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority, the Tema Gulf Club and
the Tema Community Presbyterian Church under the auspices of the Ghana
Development Tourism Company, to construct the tower as part of the Centre of
the World Project.
She said Ghana was the centre of
the World, which is the Greenwich Meridian. “It was determined by the powers
and the authorities at a meeting which took place almost a century before Ghana
became a nation,” she stated.
Madam Afeku said people often
visited the Tema Presbyterian Church to pray at the Centre of the World, while
Ghana’s First President, Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah use to go there when he was
alive once a year for spiritual retreats.
The Minister said the project
would be marketed locally and globally to attract people to have their weddings
and engagements there, advertise goods manufactured locally, as well as link
the Centre to the rest of the world so as to rake-in more revenue for the
State.
“For instance, the Tema Golf
Course could be accredited to host golf tournaments at the Centre of the World
through a Memorandum of Understanding and transform the Golf Club into a
first-class golf resort, transform the Presbyterian Church at the Centre into a
religious tourism site and develop passenger and cruise ship terminal and also
construct an iconic tower there,” she stated.
The Minister said Ghana would
host the West Africa Integrated Travel Forum between 17 and 19 of March, this
year, in Accra.
She said the forum would provide
a common platform for tourist administrators in the West African Sub-region to
share ideas and find a common ground in takling the challenges confronting the
tourism industry.
She said the forum would help
players in the tourism industry to have a common understanding in ensuring flow
of tourists across countries in the West African Sub-region.
“When we plan together as a
region, we improve our tourism revenue because our friends in East Africa are
doing it and so we want to replicate that because they have multiple
destinations, which enabled tourists to visit all tourist centres with seamless
visa controls,” she said.
Madam Afeku said the Government’s
vision was to make Ghana a tourism destination hub; therefore, all efforts were
geared towards investing in projects that would help achieve that feat.
She stated that, the Accra
Tourist Information Centre had been renovated and would soon be commissioned as
a convention and business bureau with the aim of attracting major events to
Ghana.
The Minister said the Centre had
three major restaurants to promote Eat-Ghana initiative and a Customer-Call
Centre where both domestic and foreign tourists could make enquires on various
tourist destinations in the country.
GNA
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