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Police Gun Down Suspected Armed Robber on Atebubu–Ejura Highway

By
BERNICE BESSEY
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Ghana-Police-Service
Ghana-Police-Service

The Ghana Police Service has allegedly shot dead a suspected notorious armed robber, Osman Amadu, popularly known as “Manu,” during an intelligence-led operation along the Atebubu–Ejura highway.

According to police reports, the incident occurred on March 18, 2026, at about 22:30 hours, when a team of personnel from the Police Intelligence Directorate (PID) Headquarters moved to arrest the suspect at his hideout near Atebubu.

The deceased had earlier been identified as a member of a robbery syndicate believed to be responsible for a shooting incident on March 14, 2026, along the Atebubu–Ejura highway. During that attack, gunmen reportedly fired into a moving vehicle, leaving a passenger injured.

Police say that upon arriving at the suspect’s location, an attempt was made to effect his arrest. However, Osman Amadu allegedly pulled out a single-barrel gun and opened fire on the team.

In response, the police returned fire, hitting the suspect, who fell to the ground.

A subsequent search conducted on him led to the retrieval of one single-barrel gun, five live cartridges, an amount of GH¢200.00, and a Techno Pop 10 mobile phone.

The suspect was rushed to the Atebubu Government Hospital for treatment but was pronounced dead on arrival by the attending medical officer.

His body has since been deposited at the hospital’s morgue for preservation and autopsy, while investigations into the incident continue.

 

 

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Gold For Reserves Probe Will Be Pursued …In The Future –Kon

By
JENNIFER AMBOLLEY
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Kojo Oppong Nkrumah

The Member of Parliament for Ofoase-Ayirebi, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah (KON), has vowed that efforts to probe the controversial Gold-for-Reserves programme will not be abandoned, despite Parliament’s Majority side blocking a motion for a formal inquiry.

According to him, although the proposed investigation was defeated through a voice vote in Parliament last Friday, the Minority remains resolute in its quest to ensure accountability and transparency in the management of the programme.

Speaking after the decision, Mr. Oppong Nkrumah described the Majority’s rejection of the motion as “bizarre” and a setback to Parliament’s constitutional oversight responsibility. He stressed that the refusal to investigate the initiative does not bring the matter to a close.

“There is no statute of limitations on matters such as this. The probe will be pursued, if not now, then in the future,” he stated.

The motion, which was moved by Mr. Oppong Nkrumah, in his capacity as Ranking Member on Parliament’s Economy and Development Committee, sought a comprehensive inquiry into the design, implementation, financial performance and cost structure of the Gold-for-Reserves programme.

The policy, introduced in 2021 and continued as part of Ghana’s economic strategy, aims to strengthen foreign exchange reserves, stabilise the cedi and reduce reliance on external currencies by leveraging the country’s gold resources.

However, the programme has come under increasing scrutiny amid claims of financial losses and concerns about its operational efficiency.

At the centre of the controversy are reports that the initiative recorded a loss of about $214 million in 2025.

Mr. Oppong Nkrumah argued that such claims make it imperative for Parliament to conduct a thorough, fact-based investigation to establish the true state of affairs.

He further raised concerns about the cost structure of the programme, alleging that nearly 15 percent of every $10 million released by the Bank of Ghana in 2025 was lost to handling and related charges.

“These are not matters that should be brushed aside. Parliament approved this programme and must exercise its oversight responsibility to ensure value for money,” he said.

Mr. Oppong Nkrumah also questioned the management of gold reserves under the programme, claiming that about half of the gold acquired was sold in the last quarter of 2025, even as calls for an inquiry intensified.

He described the move as puzzling, particularly given indications that government may seek to repurchase gold at higher prices.

Another critical issue raised relates to the source of gold used under the programme. The MP warned that the initiative could be indirectly relying on gold linked to illegal small-scale mining, popularly known as galamsey.

Citing estimates that a significant portion of small-scale mining activities may be illegal, he stressed the need for Parliament to investigate whether the programme is inadvertently supporting such operations.

He accused the Majority of prioritising partisanship over national interest by rejecting the motion.

“They have chosen to spin narratives instead of allowing a bipartisan inquiry to establish the facts,” he said.

Despite the setback, Mr. Oppong Nkrumah insisted that the Minority would explore alternative avenues to ensure the programme is subjected to scrutiny, adding that a future Parliament could revisit the issue.

The rejection of the motion means that key questions surrounding the Gold-for-Reserves programme, its financial performance, cost efficiency and long-term sustainability remain unresolved for now.

 

 

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Africa Can’t Afford To Miss Out On The AI Revolution -Bawumia

By
RICHARD OWUSU-AKYAW
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Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia

When Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, Ghana’s former Vice-President and one of the continent’s most prominent voices on digital transformation, addressed the London School of Economics Africa Summit last week, the room fell quiet at a single, sobering observation, Africa, he said, had missed three industrial revolutions.
Steam and coal passed the continent by. The age of electricity and mass production left Africa largely unmoved.

The computer revolution came and went without anchoring itself in African soil. Now, the fourth revolution – artificial intelligence, cloud computing, the Internet of Things is already under way and Africa is again at risk of arriving late.

But this time, Dr Bawumia argued, Ghana need not be left behind. Addressing a gathering of policymakers, scholars, innovators and students, the former vice-president presented Ghana as a country that has quietly, methodically, built the digital rails upon which an AI-powered economy can run — and called on African governments to match infrastructure investment with political courage.

“Africa does not lack talent. What we lack is deliberateness, leadership and the requisite investment to create the ecosystems where innovations and innovators thrive.”

Ghana’s Digital Foundations: A Continental Benchmark
The data Dr Bawumia presented was striking in its specificity. Ghana’s internet penetration stands at 70% — a figure that compares favourably with South Africa’s 76% and dwarfs the continent’s average of 43%, according to World Bank indicators.

Electricity access in Ghana stands at 89.5%, placing it second only to South Africa among the countries he examined.
On the Oxford Insights Government AI Readiness Index 2024, Ghana scores 43.30 out of 100 — not a perfect mark, but one that places it among the International Monetary Fund’s list of Africa’s most AI-prepared nations, alongside Kenya, Rwanda, Mauritius, Botswana and South Africa.

Dr Bawumia was candid about what underpins those numbers. Ghana’s approach, which he described as ‘holistic’, has been anchored by two transformative instruments: the Ghana Card, which has created a reliable national identity infrastructure at scale and the Digital Address System, which has given every corner of the country a locatable, usable address.

Together, they address what Bawumia identified as the most stubborn bottleneck to digital inclusion: the inability to identify citizens reliably and keep verifiable, interoperable records.
“You cannot scale digital services, let alone AI, if you cannot identify citizens reliably,” he told the summit.

The Affordability Gap: A Warning Ghana Cannot Ignore
Yet Dr Bawumia’s assessment of Ghana was not without caution. For all its comparative strengths, the former vice-president acknowledged that internet access remains financially out of reach for many Ghanaians.

According to Ghana’s National Communications Authority, the average price for one gigabyte of mobile data in 2024-2025 ranges from roughly five US cents to one dollar fifty, depending on provider and bundle. For middle and upper-income households, this is manageable. For the low-income majority, many of whom work in Ghana’s vast informal economy, regular mobile data usage remains prohibitive.
This is not a peripheral concern. It sits at the heart of whether Ghana’s digital progress translates into genuine inclusion or merely serves those already connected.

Dr Bawumia was direct: the critical policy question is not simply who is online, but ‘who is online meaningfully’ — with affordable data, adequate speeds and reliable service.
Ghana’s AI Talent Readiness score of 16.0 out of 100 — the lowest among the four countries he profiled — reinforces the point. Infrastructure without skills is a road with no vehicles on it.

The AI Imperative: Not a Luxury, a Survival Requirement
The former Vice-President’s broader argument was one that will resonate far beyond London. Digitalization, he insisted, is not a luxury that African governments can defer to some more prosperous future. It is the precondition for AI itself.

Without digitised systems producing quality data, there is no artificial intelligence that works in the public interest. ‘No data, no AI,’ he said plainly. The countries on the IMF’s AI preparedness list for Africa, Ghana among them, are without exception, also the continent’s most digitised economies.

The correlation is not coincidental.
Dr Bawumia warned that the compute-energy nexus represents a new frontier African governments must confront. The International Energy Agency projects that global data-centre electricity consumption will more than double to around 945 terawatt-hours by 2030, with AI a principal driver.

Africa currently accounts for less than one kilowatt-hour of data-centre electricity consumption per person annually, a figure that illustrates how marginal the continent remains in the global AI infrastructure map.

If that does not change, Africa risks becoming permanently dependent on external compute infrastructure, with all the sovereignty implications that entails.
Ghana in Context: Lessons from Across the Continent

The former Vice-President drew deliberate comparisons between Ghana and three other African nations to illustrate that there is no single path to AI readiness. Kenya, he argued, demonstrates the power of strategy combined with institutional capacity-building its Africa Centre of Competence for Digital and AI Skilling, developed with Microsoft and the ICT ministry, trains public servants across the continent. Rwanda, despite its relatively lower internet penetration of 34%, has distinguished itself through early policy clarity and a governance-first approach that has made it a reference point for responsible AI frameworks.

South Africa, with an AI Readiness score of 52.91 and Google Cloud’s first African cloud region now operational in Johannesburg, shows what is possible when ecosystem depth is matched by policy ambition.
Ghana’s distinct advantage, in Bawumia’s telling, is that it has built public infrastructure that others are still designing. The Ghana Card is not a pilot. The Digital Address System is operational at national scale.

The task now is governance: converting those digital rails into trusted datasets and accountable AI-enabled services, with clear privacy safeguards and transparent oversight.
“AI scales fastest where digital public infrastructure is strong, and where public trust is protected by design,” he said.

Jobs, Inequality and the Informal Economy
The question every Ghanaian household will eventually ask — what does AI mean for my job? — received a measured but sobering answer. The IMF estimates that nearly 40% of global employment is exposed to AI-driven change. In emerging market economies like Ghana, the exposure rate sits at around 40%; in low-income countries, 26%.

But the former Vice-President cautioned against interpreting these figures as a simple prediction of job losses. The more likely near-term effect, he argued, is augmentation: AI automating some tasks within jobs while freeing workers for others.
The greater risk for Ghana and its neighbours, he argued, lies not in direct automation but in the structure of African labour markets themselves.

A United Nations analysis cited in his address found that approximately 83% of African workers were in informal employment in 2024. AI will reshape livelihoods in the informal economy not primarily through robots replacing workers, but through pricing on digital platforms, access to credit, logistics efficiency, and the capacity of small businesses to operate within increasingly digital value chains. If Ghana gets those systems right, AI becomes a productivity engine. If it does not, inequality deepens.

Six Commitments for a Digital Africa
Dr Bawumia closed his address with a framework of six policy commitments he urged African governments to adopt and track. Reliable power and broadband must be treated as national infrastructure priorities.

Trustworthy data ecosystems must be built so that AI reflects African realities rather than importing foreign biases. Talent must be developed at scale, from basic digital literacy to advanced AI research.
Governments must build procurement competence to move beyond pilots to accountable, measurable deployment. Ethics must be embedded in practice through impact assessments and human oversight.

And cross-border scale must be pursued through the continental instruments already in place, the African Continental Free Trade Area’s Digital Trade Protocol and the African Union’s Continental AI Strategy, endorsed in Accra in July 2024.

That final point — the Accra endorsement — was not lost on the room. Ghana was not merely a subject of discussion. It was the site of a continental commitment. Whether Accra, Kumasi, Tamale and the communities beyond the reach of fibre-optic cables can feel the benefit of that commitment is the test that matters most.

 

 

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‘No-Bed Syndrome Is A Direct Result Of The Destruction Of LHIMS’ –Dr Amoakoh

By
BERNICE BESSEY
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Dr. Ekua Amoakoh, Deputy Spokesperson for Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia

Dr. Ekua Amoakoh, Deputy Spokesperson for former Vice-President and New Patriotic Party (NPP) flagbearer, Mahamudu Bawumia, has attributed the persistent “no bed syndrome” in Ghana’s health facilities to the dismantling of the Lightwave Health Information Management System (LHIMS) by the Mahama-led NDC administration and Health Minister Kwabena Mintah Akandoh.

Speaking on the issue, Dr. Amoakoh argued that recent developments in the health sector, particularly the introduction of a new digital platform, point to the destruction of a system she said was already working and delivering results.
Dr. Amoakoh stressed that Ghana is now committing substantial public resources to the development and deployment of a new software system for laboratory services, despite the fact that these same capabilities were already fully embedded within the LHIMS platform.

The deputy Spokesperson Bawumia underscored that this duplication of effort not only represents a wasteful use of scarce national resources but also exposes a lack of continuity in policy direction.

According to her, LHIMS was designed as an integrated, end-to-end digital health solution, enabling real-time coordination across facilities, including the tracking of bed availability nationwide.

She argued that the abandonment of such a system has directly undermined efficient patient management, contributing significantly to the resurgence of the “no bed syndrome,” where patients are referred between facilities without prior confirmation of space availability.

She referenced remarks by the Minister of Health, Kwabena Mintah Akandoh, who at a media engagement at the Jubilee House announced the rollout of the Ghana Health Information Management System (GHIMS) to replace the suspended LHIMS.
According to her, the Minister’s explanation that the transition to GHIMS would end manual medical record-keeping in Ghana’s health facilities was, in effect, an admission that LHIMS had been abandoned.

She maintained that the move had contributed directly to inefficiencies within the healthcare system, including the worsening of the no bed syndrome.
Dr. Amoakoh further contended that the government’s justification for discontinuing LHIMS, including claims of procurement irregularities and technical shortcomings, was misleading.

She rejected assertions by the Minister that the $100 million LHIMS contract, awarded in 2019 to connect 950 health facilities, had significantly underperformed.
Meanwhile, a leaked confidential document submitted to the Ghana Health Service has brought renewed scrutiny to the country’s ongoing digital health transition, exposing an ambitious and highly compressed plan to deploy an Integrated National Laboratory Information System (INLIS) within just seven months.

The document, prepared by MedTrack Technologies Limited, and marked “Confidential & Proprietary”, outlines what it describes as an “Accelerated Deployment” model for the development of the Integrated National Laboratory Information System (INLIS).

According to the document, the project timeline has been drastically reduced from an initial 39-month schedule to a seven-month implementation window, raising critical concerns about feasibility, governance, and the broader direction of Ghana’s health digitisation agenda.

The contents of the leaked plan suggest an aggressive restructuring of conventional project delivery processes, with technical development scheduled to begin as early as the third week, well before requirements gathering is completed.

This “hyper-parallel execution model,” as described in the document, effectively eliminates the traditional step-by-step approach in favour of overlapping phases, where planning, development, and testing occur simultaneously.
The document further reveals that the pilot rollout of the system is expected to commence by the fifth month, leaving very little room for system stabilisation or user adaptation before national scale-up.

It explicitly warns that the success of the entire project is dependent on what it calls an “accelerated governance model,” requiring the Ghana Health Service to respond to approvals, feedback and stakeholder coordination within 24 to 48 hours.
Perhaps most striking is the document’s own admission of risk.

It concedes that compressing a nearly three-and-a-half-year project into seven months introduces significant implementation challenges and states that success would be difficult to achieve without extraordinary intervention from top-level authorities.

It cautions that even minor delays could have disproportionate consequences, noting that a one-week setback could account for five percent of the total project timeline.
The plan places heavy demands on the Ghana Health Service, calling for the immediate availability of regional directors, laboratory heads, and technical personnel, as well as the embedding of decision-makers within project teams to fast-track approvals.

It also proposes a drastic reduction in standard review timelines, replacing multi-week approval cycles with a 24-hour sign-off protocol to keep development on track.
Beyond concerns about speed and feasibility, the emergence of the document raises deeper questions about policy continuity and resource utilisation within Ghana’s health sector.

The INLIS system, as described, includes functionalities such as laboratory data management, integration with DHIS2 platforms, and real-time reporting capabilities—features that analysts say are not entirely new to the country’s digital health ecosystem.
This has fueled debate over whether the country is investing in parallel systems rather than consolidating existing infrastructure, particularly at a time when healthcare facilities continue to grapple with operational challenges.

The document also indicates the risks associated with such a compressed rollout, including potential delays in stakeholder engagement, bottlenecks in approvals, and integration hurdles with existing systems. It warns that any expansion in project scope, even minor additions, could derail the timeline, prompting a strict policy to defer additional features beyond the initial phase.

 

 

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Catholic Bishops Rally Behind Mahama

By
RICHARD OWUSU-AKYAW
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President John Dramani Mahama

The Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference has thrown its weight behind President John Dramani Mahama, following the controversial withdrawal of an Honorary Doctorate by Lincoln University.

In a strongly worded statement signed by its President, Most Rev. Matthew Kwasi Gyamfi, the Conference expressed “fraternal solidarity” with Mr. Mahama, while raising concerns over what it described as troubling circumstances surrounding the decision.

According to the Bishops, although institutions must be respected for their autonomy, the move by the American university underscores the urgent need for transparency, fairness and respect for national dignity.

The Catholic leadership pointed to Ghana’s historic ties with Lincoln University, an institution closely linked to Kwame Nkrumah, suggesting that such a decision carries broader symbolic implications beyond the individual.

COMMENDATION FOR GLOBAL LEADERSHIP

Despite the controversy, the Bishops praised Mr. Mahama for what they described as his growing international stature, particularly his role in rallying global support for a recent United Nations resolution, addressing the legacy of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade.

They noted that his efforts demonstrate a commitment to justice, historical accountability, and solidarity with African peoples and the diaspora.

ASSEMBLIES OF GOD PRAISED

The Conference also singled out the Assemblies of God Church, Ghana for commendation, describing its public backing of Mr. Mahama as “principled and forthright.”

Special mention was made of the church’s General Secretary, Rev. Ernest Birikorang, whose response the Bishops said reflected moral clarity, pastoral responsibility and commitment to national values.

PUSH FOR ANTI-LGBTQ+ BILL

Touching on the controversial Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill, the Catholic Bishops urged Parliament to expedite its transmission to the President for assent.

They called on all relevant state actors to act with urgency and a strong sense of national duty in advancing the legislation, which continues to dominate public discourse.

The Bishops further assured the President of their prayers, expressing hope that he would be guided with wisdom, courage and clarity in taking a decisive position on the Bill.

CALL FOR UNITY AND PRAYER

In a unifying appeal, the Conference echoed calls for national reflection and prayer, stressing the need for cohesion among Christian groups and the wider Ghanaian society.

“We entrust our nation and its leaders to the guidance of Almighty God,” the statement concluded, while assuring Ghanaians of continued prayers for peace, unity and wisdom.

 

 

 

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Legal Education Reform Bill Means More Than Just Another Campaign Fulfilled

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admin
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Attorney General, Dr Dominic Ayine

This afternoon, while the Deputy Attorney General was in court to prevent NPP Ashanti Regional Chairman Bernard Antwi Bosiako, aka Chairman Wontumi’s lawyers from securing long adjournments to delay the trial, Parliament passed the Legal Education Reform Bill, 2026.

This new Bill, when assented to by President John Mahama, revolutionises the legal education landscape in Ghana and moves us forward from a moribund system that has been run for over 6 decades.

As we await the Bill in its final form for the specific provisions passed by Parliament, here are some of its key expected reforms;

  • Establishment of the Council for Legal Education and Training to succeed the functions of the Board of Legal Education of the General Legal Council in the regulation of the training of Lawyers
  • Shortening the route to becoming a Lawyer from 6 years to a lesser number of years.
  • Introduction of a Law Practice Training Course, which will be offered by accredited Universities to prepare eligible candidates for a National Bar Examination to become Lawyers.
  • Enhanced regulatory mechanisms to improve curriculum and training standards for the training of Lawyers
  • Removing the Ghana School of Law monopoly and making the Ghana School of Law a competitor institution to accredited Universities in the training of Lawyers
  • Of course, with the abolishment of the Ghana School of Law monopoly comes the scrapping of dreaded Entrance Exams.

This Bill has been the brainchild of the current Attorney General, Dr Dominic Ayine.

Dr Ayine, an academic who had taught for many years and had been involved in the training of Lawyers in Ghana, had observed the troubling state of legal education and had long mooted ideas for its reform.

He had, therefore, as a matter of personal conviction and commitment to this Republic, made a promise that, when given the opportunity, he would propose radical reforms to transform the legal education landscape and respond to modern needs.

He began by making input into the NDC Manifesto on legal reforms and when the party got the opportunity to be in power put into motion the agenda for reform by galvanising stakeholder support, doing the preparatory work, personally getting involved in the legislative drafting of the Bill and taking it through all the Parliamentary stages to culminate in what has now become the new Legal Education Reform Bill.

This is more than a campaign promise fulfilled.

This development is a landmark and a seismic shift in the largely obsolete mechanism of the legal education regime, which has long been attended by barriers to access, high costs, bureaucracies, and institutional rigidities.

By removing the artificial distinction we have long maintained between the academic and professional training models, we not only do away with the annual law school admission crises but also better train Lawyers in multidisciplinary, research-focused, and curriculum-driven academic spaces.

Currently, legal education is structured to serve the needs of litigation. While that in itself may not be the problem, the over-concentration on litigation rules and procedure has led to less emphasis on other critical skills needed to better equip today’s Lawyer.

I expect that the implementation of these new reforms will move us toward a paradigm of equipping students with critical thinking, problem-solving, negotiation, and digital ecosystem-adept skills through modern pedagogical models.

By doing so, we create a legal education space where its products ultimately contribute skills and knowledge to the social, economic, and political transformation of our country while maintaining the quality, standards, and discipline that have become the allure of the profession.

Importantly, in the next few years, Ghana will have many more lawyers to support both the economic and social expansion it intends to pursue, thanks to the vision and industry of Dr Dominic Akuritinga Ayine.

By Benjamin Apha Aidoo  

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The writer, Benjamin Apha Aidoo, is a lawyer and a communications practitioner

Credit: myjoyonline.com

Editorial: CAF Is Killing African Football – And It Knows It

By
THE CHRONICLE
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Editorial

There is an old and sacred principle in football: the match is decided on the pitch. It is a principle that has governed the beautiful game since its founding, transcending borders, cultures, and political systems. Yet last month, the Confederation of African Football (CAF) dealt that principle a devastating blow – one whose tremors are still being felt across the continent and beyond.

When CAF’s appeal board stripped Senegal of its 2025 Africa Cup of Nations title on March 17 and awarded it to Morocco two months after Senegal had won the January 18 final in extra time, it did not merely overturn a scoreline. It overturned the legitimacy of African football itself.

The reasoning offered by CAF, that Senegalese players had temporarily walked off the pitch in protest of a disallowed goal and a contentious late penalty, fails to justify so seismic a verdict. Temporary stoppages, referee disputes and player protests are not rare events in football. They have never before been grounds for stripping a champion of its crown and the decision which handed Morocco a 3-0 technical victory has provoked near-universal condemnation.

Former Liberian president and footballing icon, George Weah, the only African to win the Ballon d’Or said the ruling had “scarred and blemished” African football. His words carry the authority of both legend and statesman and they should ring loudly in the corridors of CAF’s headquarters. When voices of such stature speak in unison with millions of ordinary African fans, the governing body would be foolish to dismiss the outcry as noise.

The optics of this ruling are deeply troubling. Questions about the role of Fouzi Lekjaa – simultaneously Morocco’s budget minister and CAF’s first vice president in the appeal process have not been adequately answered.

CAF President Patrice Motsepe has denied preferential treatment, yet has himself acknowledged the “mistrust” now pervading African football. Acknowledgement without accountability, however, is not leadership. When an institution’s own president concedes that trust has been broken, the institutional response must be far more vigorous than reassurances.

The Chronicle recognises that sporting bodies must have mechanisms for discipline and appeal. Rules must be enforced. But there is a critical distinction between enforcing rules and weaponising process.

The AFCON final was played to completion. A winner was determined. To reverse that outcome months later in a boardroom, not on the grass, sets a precedent that threatens the integrity of every future African football competition. If titles can be reassigned after the fact, what meaning does victory hold?

The damage extends well beyond sport. Senegal’s government has rightly appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, describing the ruling as “grossly illegal and profoundly unjust.”

Senegal President Bassirou Diomaye Faye has made his position unmistakable, the trophy sitting proudly behind him in photographs that have circled the globe. Senegal will not capitulate and frankly, nor should it. The Senegalese Football Federation is right to pursue every legal avenue available. CAF cannot be allowed to adjudicate its own controversies in isolation from international scrutiny.

The Chronicle believes the timing of this scandal is particularly cruel. The 2025 AFCON was shaping up to be a watershed moment, with record audiences and growing global respect for African football. European sceptics among them commentators who continue to dismiss AFCON as a minor tournament have been handed fresh ammunition.

French former coach Alain Giresse captured the grief shared by millions when he lamented what people would now say about African football. That it is not serious. That it is not rigorous. Years of hard-won credibility risk being undone by one catastrophic governance failure.

African football deserves better. Its players are world-class. Its fans are passionate and loyal beyond measure. Its tournaments, when well-governed, inspire a continent of over a billion people. The question now is whether CAF’s leadership possesses the courage to confront its own failures.

The ruling must be reviewed. The conflict of interest allegations must be independently investigated. And the governing body must undertake genuine, transparent reforms, not merely to restore Senegal’s honour, but to protect the future of the game on this continent.

We insist Football must be decided on the pitch. If CAF cannot guarantee that, then it is not merely Senegal’s title that has been stripped, it is Africa’s faith in the institution entrusted to steward its greatest game.

 

 

 

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Donors cheer up SHS Arts students for decorating Asokwa Interchange

By
ERNEST BEST ANANE
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ACFO Peter Tetteh presenting the items to Amoh Kamel, MCE for Asokwa

Individuals and institutions have trooped to the Asokwa Interchange with food, drinks and cash donations to support Visual Arts students from Senior High Schools who are engaged in decorating the Asokwa Interchange.

Big Pierro Company presenting the items and cash to the Coordinator of Ashanti Festival

The project forms part of the novelle Ashanti Festival 2026.

Among the donors were Big Pierro Company Ltd., which supplied  water, ten crates of soft  drinks and GH¢20,000; AU Ambassador to Ghana, “Mr. Bob”, who donated paints, bread and hot meals, while  the Ashanti Regional Fire Command, led by ACFO Peter Tetteh, also donated assorted drinks and Water, with  the musical group, The Survival, in performamce.

Festival Coordinator, Mr. Emmanuel Opoku Anane, thanked the donors, saying their support would go a long way to motivate the students to take Visual Arts seriously.

“Your contributions will not go to waste,” he assured, adding that the project has inspired the youth, while beautifying the city.

 

 

 

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Filmmakers Summit Held in Kumasi to boost Kumawood Industry

By
ERNEST BEST ANANE
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James Gardiner, Deputy CEO of the Ghana Film Authority

A Filmmakers Summit has been held in Kumasi to revitalise the Ghanaian film industry as part of the Ashanti Festival 2026.

Secretary to the Kumawood Board of Directors, Emmanuel Opoku Anane, said the summit is designed to enhance the industry’s vibrancy and sustainability by bringing veterans and young creators together to share ideas.

According to him, the participants have the chance to meet the legends who entertained them, contribute and revive the industry.

Mr. Anane recalled Kumawood’s past impact on jobs and economic growth in Ashanti, adding that while recent lapses have affected output, the Summit sought to build a legacy for future generations.

He commended government’s creation of a Film Fund to support the sector.

Deputy CEO of the Ghana Film Authority, James Gardiner, disclosed that GH¢20 million has been earmarked by the Finance Ministry to reposition the industry, attract investors and strengthen distribution.

He stressed the need for policy reforms, talent development and technical training to ensure Ghanaian films compete globally, drive tourism and promote the country as a production hub.

Participants agreed that collaboration, financing and professional standards are critical to reviving the sector and sustaining its economic contribution.

 

 

 

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Ultra-modern Community Centre commissioned for Toase

By
SEBASTIAN R. FREIKU
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The Toasehene being assisted by the Tepamanhene (right) to commission the Community Centre

A 1,000 capacity state-of-the-art Community Centre has been built by Nana Yim Awere Ababio, Toasehene, for the people of Toase in the Atwima Nwabiagya South Municipality of the Ashanti region.

The Yim Awere Ababio Dwabrem

The GHC7 million facility, christened Yim Awere Ababio Dwabrem, which has two conference halls, a spacious area, 12 shops, showroom, self contained accommodation unit, 1,500 chairs and 50 tables will serve the purpose of cultural, social and political gathering in the locality.

The Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, urged chiefs and traditional leaders to be development oriented to leave a legacy to their communities.

He said the focus should be on improving the lot of their subjects and communities, as the war to be waged.

The Tepamanhene, Nana Adusei Atwenewaa Ampem, who represented the Asantehene at the commissioning of the Yim Awere Ababio Dwabrem, noted that the world is fast becoming competitive and needs visionary leaders to guide the youth to succeed through transformational initiatives, hence the need for leaders to empower their communities.

The Municipal Chief Executive, Wisdom Osei Boamah commended the Toasehene for the foresight and initiative and assured his continuous collaboration with traditional rulers to champion community growth, development and prosperity.

Aerial view of the Community Centre

Nana Yim Awee Ababio frowned on poor sanitation and urged the people to adopt good sanitation as a lifestyle and habit, to impact positively on society.

The occasion was graced by distinguished traditional leaders, including Tepamanhene, Otumfuo Mamensenhene, Nkawie Kumaahene and his Queen mother, as well as Atwima Kwanwomahene among others.

 

 

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