Morocco’s Ambassador Praises Akufo Addo…For Implementing Free Education

By Kwabena Adu Koranteng

 Morocco’s Ambassador to Ghana, his Excellency Mohammed Farahat, has praised the president of Ghana, Nana Akufo Addo for the leadership role played in the implementation of the Free Senior High School Program.

He said education is key to development and any leader who shows interest in providing quality and free education to his people is a leader who has vision and must be supported by all. He urged African leaders to learn from the good leadership role being played by President Akufo Addo to develop the human resource of their countries.

Addressing a section of the media at a news conference in Accra on Monday, Ambassador Farahat said   based on the bilateral agreements signed between the government of Ghana and the Morocco; investors from Morocco are undertaking many investment projects in many sectors of the Ghanaian economy. This includes education, energy, and agriculture health among others. He noted that Moroccan companies are working on building solar plants and stations in western region and others are undertaking feasibility studies on wind energy in the Ashanti region in a bid to increase and sustain Ghana’s energy mix.

“About 25 agreements were signed between Ghana and Morocco on the visit of the King of Morocco, Mohammed VI in January this year. All of these agreements are being implemented without challenges except the technical ones like the stock exchange and banking”.

Our aim is to make Ghana’s economy benefit greatly from Morocco’s Free trade agreement. On Education, we grant scholarship to about 70 Ghanaians students every year to go to Morocco and study in our universities. We are working to increase the number gradually to get more Ghanaian students on board.

He mentioned that the 8^th International Summit of cities and Territorial Communities of Africa held from 20^th to 24^th November, 2018, the king of Morocco, made it clear that there was a national consensus on promoting child related issues. The king said Africa has shown its ability to define and implement development and integration policies and strategies and therefore needed new perspectives for a greater contribution from the continents local and regional authorities.

The king also consolidated the role of African cities and territories as key actors in the implementation of the international agendas adopted by the United Nations in 2015 and 2016 which includes the 2030 agenda for sustainable development Goals, the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and Nationally Determined Contributions for the implementation of the agreements as well as the new Urban Agenda adopted in Quito.

He indicated that the pan African meeting was an opportunity to raise awareness of the new responsibilities of regional leaders to explore ways and means to fully shoulder their responsibilities, to think about strategies to be defined  and to commit as soon as possible to transition to sustainable cities and territories in Africa .

MIGRATION

Ambassador Farahat said Morocco would  host the intergovernmental conference on international migration in December to discus issues related to migration and illegal immigrants.

He said the conference would see the adoption of the global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration.

“In 2016, the UN General Assembly adopted unanimously the  71/1 resolution dubbed “ New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants,” leading to the adoption of the global compact, which will take place on December 10-11, 2018 in Morocco”.

This is not the only international event that will take place in 2018. The intergovernmental conference will complete the world forum on migration and development, to be co-chaired by Morocco and Germany.

The global compact for migration aims to address humanitarian, human rights-related and developmental aspects of international migration, according to International Organization for Migration (IOM).It also aims to protect the safety and dignity for all migrants, regardless of their documents’ status. The compact vows to ease pressures on countries that welcome and host refugees, build self-reliance of refugees, expand access to resettlement in developing countries and other complementary pathways, and foster conditions that enable refugees voluntarily to return to their home countries.

In recent years, Morocco has established itself as a country of destination rather than just being a transit country for refugees and migrants, aiming to reach Europe. Morocco have also set up regularization campaign for migrants and refugees, who are aiming to settle in the country.