NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
I think one of the pains I have over my life is the fact that as a nation we have made so little progress in 54 years which is absolute waste of the lives of millions of people. So it is an area that I have done a lot of studies leading nations and I have found out that no matter how poor a country is with the right type of leadership within one generation the country would develop. Therefore when a country goes through this almost vicious cycle of poverty and changes of government and we are still not transformed, it becomes painful.
In my limited research I have come out with certain fundamental things. Its actual application varies from country to country but for underdeveloped countries like us, the first is the quality of political leadership in terms of their commitment to national development. Their commitment to the wealth of people, their visions and their willingness to submit their own individual agenda to the bigger national good it so critical because you know they have a role they play which nobody can replace. People think the private sector can replace the government but no it is impossible so it is very, very important for us to look at in that way.
The first flow from Political leadership is very important and guarantees a sustainable peace and security which provide the frame work and the incentive for development. So when this is in place other factors are able to make a difference. But in our country for example the governments are scarcely the national governments they turn to be NPP and NDC government which is terrible. It is incurable and yet this is what we see around us.
The second flows from having a national vision and development agenda. You cannot prevent people from being tribally aligned. So you super impose a national vision and agenda which allows people to see from the same view so to speak.
The third is about public service. They come in three forms, the first what I call the guiding equalization. These are people who actually elaborate the national vision and direct it and mobilize support from it.
Then the secretariat of government which they call civil service implementers because their responsibility is to implement this agenda. The third has to do with certain common services that are needed in a developing country. We are talking about the producers and distributors of energy, water, managers of national transport and communication systems. They are very, very important; call them the national commons so important. As part of the public service among these special institutions are peace and judiciary.
If these three things are in place then comes what I call the ordinary productive private sectors creating an enable environment so important.
The public services I think that we have often times not known that public service create the needed environment for the wealth of the nation; the ordinary workers, the entrepreneurs, teachers, farmers etc. These are needed not so much intended to be the direct producers but to create the enabling environment, the regulation and stimulation.
Public sector development requires certain foundations thus quality education, power development, quality transport and communication. Modern development cannot go on without energy, not without access to water, sanitation and ICT as a back bone, a situation whereby if you want to have an industry in Ghana you have to provide your own toilet, you have to provide your own standby generators etc.
So it is quite important to make sure that these ones are focused on to provide the platform for the private sector. In other words each country would have its own peculiarities but then there are certain basic things required in order for things to be done. When these are done you must go to the next one which is creating a national competitive advantage and these things come together to be able to produce generally at a low unit cost cause other than that you would not survive in the world.