Chinese Government – Obrempong-Nana Kwaku Ampomah

Mr. ZHU Jing, Charge d’Affaires of the Chinese Embassy to Ghana in his welcome address noted that this year marks the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between China and Ghana. 60 year ago, Chairman Mao Zedong and President Dr. Kwame Nkrumah made the historic decision to establish diplomatic relations, making Ghana the second country in sub-Saharan Africa to do so.

The Chinese Embassy and Ghana Post have successfully co-designed and printed 10,000 sets of commemorative stamps, as one of the serial celebrations for the anniversary. I have the pleasure to reveal and introduce you the design of the stamps.
With the background of a flag of the Republic of Ghana, there’s one big stamp, featuring with a historic picture of the founders of our two countries, President Kwame Nkrumah and Chairman Mao Tse-Tung in the 1960s. It shows the heartfelt delight they share in establishing the bilateral relations. In the past 60 years, the depth of this relationship had become more robust and diverse.

Every year, the Chinese government provides Ghanaians around one thousand fully sponsored training opportunities in China, which we believe will further enhance mutual understanding and deepen our friendship, Mr Zhu noted.

Looking ahead, we will continue to follow and work on the direction pointed out by our leaders, and spare no effort to deepen the diplomatic relations, facilitate the already robust economic and commercial actives, and boost cultural and people to people exchanges. I’m sure the relationship between China and Ghana will continue to thrive for mutual benefit and prosperity.

Some dignitaries who attended the launch are Hon. George Andah, Deputy Minister for Communications, Amb. Kojo Amoo-Gottfried, President of Ghana-China Friendship Association and former Ambassador to China.
Madam Apenteng Magdalne, Chief Director for Communications, Mr. Samuel Boafo Adu, Director of Post from Communications, Mr. George Afedzi Hayford, Board Chairman of Ghana Post, Mr. James Kwofie, Managing Director of Ghana Post, Mr. John Otuteye, Executive Director from the Postal & Courier Regulatory Commission,
Dr. Nana Baah Wiredu, Chairman of the Stamp Advisory Committee.

Below is the full statement

Welcome Remarks by Mr. ZHU Jing, Charge d’Affaires of the Chinese Embassy to Ghana at the Launch of Commemorative Stamps for the 60th Anniversary of China-Ghana Relations
(October 20, 2020)

Hon. George Andah, Deputy Minister for Communications,
Amb. Kojo Amoo-Gottfried, President of Ghana-China Friendship Association and former Ambassador to China.
Madam Apenteng Magdalne, Chief Director for Communications, Mr. Samuel Boafo Adu, Director of Post from Communications, Mr. George Afedzi Hayford, Board Chairman of Ghana Post, Mr. James Kwofie, Managing Director of Ghana Post, Mr. John Otuteye, Executive Director from the Postal & Courier Regulatory Commission,
Dr. Nana Baah Wiredu, Chairman of the Stamp Advisory Committee, Distinguished guests,
Friends from media, Good morning! Welcome to the Chinese Embassy.

This year marks the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between China and Ghana. 60 year ago, Chairman Mao Zedong and President Dr. Kwame Nkrumah made the historic decision to establish diplomatic relations, making Ghana the second country in sub-Saharan Africa to do so.

In the past 60 years, China-Ghana relations have grown from strength to strength under the strong leadership of successive leaders of our two countries. We are pleased to see close high-level exchange in recent years, particularly the state visit to China by H.E. President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo in September 2018 and the successful visit to Ghana by H.E. Vice Premier Sun Chunlan of China in November 2019.
Our relations are bearing fruits in the areas of trade and investment, technology transfer, infrastructure and people-to-people exchanges. The bilateral trade volume hit 7.46 billion USD in 2019.

China is now Ghana’s largest trading partner, the biggest source of foreign investment and the biggest provider of human resource training. Ghana has become the 7th largest trading partner of China in Africa. Until 2019, more than 6,500 Ghanaian students are studying in China, ranking the 2nd in the sub-Saharan Africa. Nearly 700 Ghanaian students have received Chinese government scholarships in recent two years. Tens of thousands of people traveled between our two countries each year.

Ladies and gentlemen, The Chinese Embassy and Ghana Post have successfully co-designed and printed 10,000 sets of commemorative stamps, as one of the serial celebrations for the anniversary. I have the pleasure to reveal and introduce you the design of the stamps.

With the background of a flag of the Republic of Ghana, there’s one big stamp, featuring with a historic picture of the founders of our two countries, President Kwame Nkrumah and Chairman Mao Tse-Tung in the 1960s. It shows the heartfelt delight they share in establishing the bilateral relations. In the past 60 years, the depth of this relationship had become more robust and diverse.

Beside the big stamp, there are four smaller stamps, each featured with the most symbolic development cooperation projects between China and Ghana in the past decade.
The first one is the Cape Coast Stadium. It used to be the biggest grant project by the Chinese government in Ghana with a contract amount of 33 million US dollars. Completed by January 2016 with facilities of 16,000 seats, 8 runway tracks, and a natural grass football yard, it has become one of the landmarks in Ghana.

The second one for the Bui Hydroelectric Project. It’s one of the largest energy projects in the history of Republic of Ghana, producing 15%-20% of Ghana’s electricity, supported by Chinese preferential loan.

The third one of the four pictures the Kpong Water Supply Expansion Project. Though not as well-known as the stadium, it has been one of the major provider of clean water for the Greater Accra region, also supported by Chinese preferential loan.
The last but not the least, the University of Health and Allied Science (UHAS). It is a grant project with first phase completed in 2015 and the second phase three time scale of the first phase started last year. We aim to build it into one of the most beautiful and modern universities in Ghana.

After my description, you must have a rough picture of how the commemorative stamps look like.

Actually, these are just a small portion of economic and development cooperation between the two countries. Others like the Satellite TV for 300 Ghanaian Villages project is providing thousands villagers free access to satellite TV; the 1,000 Boreholes Project is providing potable drinking water for more than 300,000 people in remote areas; the Jamestown Fishing Port, the Ghana Technical And Vocational Training Centers Upgrading Project are in steady progress despite the COVID-19 pandemic.
All these projects demonstrates China’s sincerity of building up our friendship.

Speaking of COVID-19, China and Ghana have supported each other immensely fighting the pandemic. China has been making great efforts in health cooperation with Ghana. Since 2009, China has dispatched nine batches of medical teams to Ghana. The LEKMA Hospital, a Government Health facility, was built in 2010 as a China-Ghana Friendship Hospital with US$7.28 million assistance from the Chinese Government. With Chinese President Xi Jinping promise African countries priority access to COVID-19 Vaccine, health cooperation is certain to be further strengthened.

China is also devoting a lot in human resource development cooperation with Ghana. Every year, the Chinese government provides Ghanaians around one thousand fully sponsored training opportunities in China, which we believe will further enhance mutual understanding and deepen our friendship.
Looking ahead, we will continue to follow and work on the direction pointed out by our leaders, and spare no effort to deepen the diplomatic relations, facilitate the already robust economic and commercial actives, and boost cultural and people to people exchanges. I’m sure the relationship between China and Ghana will continue to thrive for mutual benefit and prosperity.

Story: Sheila Satori Mensa

The Chinese Government on Wednesday, presented its second batch of medical supplies, to the Ministry of Health, to support Ghana in the fight the COVID-19 pandemic.
The supplies were made up of 20,000 N-95 protective face masks, 350,000 surgical masks, 10,000 disposable coverall, 15,000 each of medical googles, and disposable gloves and 3,000 disposable shoe covers.

Dr Zhou Jing, the Charge d’affaires of the Chinese Embassy, handed over the supplies to the Ministry represented by Dr Bernard Oko-Boye, the Deputy Minister of Health at a short ceremony in Accra.

According to Dr Zhou the Chinese Government was the first to send medical supplies via chartered aircraft to 18 African countries including Ghana, to assist in ensuring the safety of especially frontline healthcare workers at the initial stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The subsequent gesture by the Government of China, he said, was a reciprocity of the global solidarity shown the country when it was hard hit by the pandemic at the early stages.
He said China’s situation was improving quickly with no single case of domestic infection for the past one month now, except for the new cases being imported into the country due to incoming flights, and the country had also witnessed improved economy growth by a 3.2 per cent in the second quarter, from its initial fall by 6.8 per cent in the first quarter of the year.

Dr Zhou commended the government of Ghana and its Agencies for working hard to manage the spread of the virus and said the Chinese Government would make the COVID-19 Vaccine that was being developed, readily accessible and affordable to all when they were ready for use, and urged countries to remain in solidarity in fighting the common global enemy.

Dr Oko-Boye, thanked the benefactors for the donation and the partnership that existed between the two countries and said although Ghana was confident of winning the war against the COVID-19 quickly, it needed strong partnership in ways to protect its citizens from the importation of the virus.

“That is why Ghana insists on a negative PCR test before getting on board a plane, and the subjection of ones’ self to an Antigen test,” to tell the current COVID-19 status of a person and their capability of transmitting the virus to others if tested positive.

According to Dr Oko-Boye the current number of active cases of 564 persons as at the last update, was inspiring and encouraging and urged Ghanaians to continue to observe all the safety and hygiene protocols including the mandatory wearing of face masks and the social distancing rule, to help sustain the gains made.

The Deputy Health Ministry, however, warned Ghanaians against complacency, saying, the war was not yet over and “COVID-19 is among the few situations where one man’s precaution is not enough, but everyone must be interested in the safety of others, as one person’s recklessness, could ruin all the important things put in place.”

He said the donation by the Chinese Government re-echoed the fact that the war was not over yet, and appeal to the media to the sustain education and advocacy against COVID-19 related stigma and timely reporting of cases to save lives.

Story: Sheila Satori Mensa