President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has said Ghana has not reached its full potential despite the 25 years of uninterrupted peace in the country since the birth of the fourth republic on 7 January 1993.

According to him, eradicating poverty continues to be the biggest challenge facing the country. To this end, he believes Ghana should shift from a raw material exporting country to a value added and industralised economy. This he says will be the way towards growth and prosperity for the Ghanaian people.

Nana Akufo-Addo said this at the National Thanksgiving Service to mark 25 years of the fourth republic at the Black Star Square in Accra on Sunday, 7 January, 2018.

“Despite all these gains, we must acknowledge that we have not reached the potential we should have. The biggest challenge we face continues to be eradicating widespread poverty, we still have challenges in the performance of our public service, we face threats traditional and contemporary to our nation’s stability and social security in the form of chieftaincy conflicts, land disputes, ethnic conflicts, vigilantism, cyber security issues, youth unemployment, economic hardships and corruption in our public lives,” he stated.

Nana Akufo-Addo noted that: “The fundamental commitment to resolving these challenges within the framework of due process must be unshaken. Primarily, we began to take a deep look at the structure of our economy and transform it from a raw material producing exporting one to a value added and industralised economy with a modernised agriculture to serve better our needs. The era of Ghana’s industrialisation has dawn so that we can trade in the global market place, not on the basis of raw material but on the basis of things we make inspired by our sense of enterprise, creativity and innovation. It is the most effective way we can generate jobs and wealth for the masses of our people and enjoy the rights of the developed prosperous nations of the world.”

The event was attended by the three former presidents of the fourth republic, political party representatives, Ministers of state, religious leaders and the general public.