Use dialogue to solve national issues — Presbyterian Church

The Presbyterian Church of Ghana (PCG) has urged political leaders to use dialogue to solve the country's challenges, instead of resorting to threats, which could tamper with the peace of the country.

It said political leaders occupied important positions with the main aim of bringing development to the people; hence, they were supposed to always take positions that would protect the interest of the people.

Speaking to the Daily Graphic in an exclusive interview in Accra last Monday, ahead of this year’s national convocation of the church, also known as the General Assembly, the Clerk of the General Assembly of the PCG, Rev. Dr Godwin Nii Noi Odonkor, acknowledged that the economy was facing challenges, which the citizenry was not happy about.

He said politicians must solve the challenges collectively with other stakeholders to bring relief to the people.

Threats

Rev. Dr Odonkor expressed concern that oftentimes, such threats created the wrong impression to the youth, some of whom might be agitated and thus capitalise on what their leaders said to cause trouble, which would threaten the peace of the country.

He cited an example of the recent threats by the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) that they were going to occupy the Bank of Ghana (BoG) to demand the resignation of the Governor.

Such an approach, he said, only sent a negative message, particularly at a time when many people were not happy about the economic situation in the country.

"Yes, we are having challenges with the economy.

It is obvious that nobody is happy with it.

But I believe such threats are not the solution.

Rather, collectively, we can come together and build the economy," he stressed.

On the Cecilia Dapaah issue, he cautioned the media to be circumspect in their reportage in order not to misinform the public.

He called for people to allow investigations into the matter to be completed and stop putting out false information, which only jeopardised the work of institutions handling the matter.

Contribution to National development

Touching on some contributions of the church to national development, the Clerk of the General Assembly of the PCG stated that the church had contributed immensely in many areas, especially in education and health, where it had built schools, colleges of education, universities and health facilities, among others, in the rural areas where these facilities well served the people.

"We have 2400 basic schools, 38 senior high schools (SHSs), five colleges of education and two universities.

"At 195 years as a church, we pride ourselves as being the oldest and we have done a lot to develop the country, especially human resources," he stated.

The church, he said, was currently building infirmaries in all Presbyterian SHSs.