President John Agyekum Kufuor on Tuesday said for Ghana's socio-economic development efforts to become the pacesetter in West Africa and among its neighbouring countries required the support and assistance of such developed countries as the United States.

"Our country and the West Africa sub-region are ready to take off in socio-economic development and all we need is a country like the US to be an advocate for us to the developed countries," he added. President Kufuor made the call when Mr Paul O'Neill, US Treasury Secretary, led a 16-member delegation to call on him at the Castle, Osu.

Mr O'Neill is in Ghana on a three-day official visit at the start of a two-week African tour that would also take him to South Africa, Uganda and Ethiopia to meet key business, trade and government leaders. His wife, Nancy and daughter as well as Paul "Bono" Hewson, a renowned musician, accompanied Mr O'Neill.

The tour will give Mr O'Neill the opportunity to highlight efforts to enhance the effectiveness of development assistance, the importance of increasing productivity through investment in human capital and the role of the private sector as an engine of growth in Africa.

It will also highlight and enhance the effectiveness of treasury department's policies. President Kufuor said government was determined to make Ghanaians manage their own destiny through democratic principles, good governance and rule of law. "We will do the best for the country and ourselves and develop Ghana to be the pacesetter in the West Africa Sub-region."

He noted that most countries in the sub-region were best with civil strife, coups d'etats, poverty and diseases. Ghana, the President added, wants to break loose and join the countries of advancement in socio-economic development and information technology.

President Kufuor said such achievements required the support and assistance of countries, which had much concern for humanity such as the US.

"We need to lay the foundation and infrastructure for development. We have the natural resources for development and to attract investors; we have to put ourselves in position and prepare the grounds for development partners to come and assist us."

Mr O'Neill said the US government had confidence in the capability of the Ghanaian to assist the government to make the country prosperous. He said he was convinced that when people realised that their government had the potential through transparency in governance and effective fiscal and monetary policies, they would take the necessary steps to ensure such policies succeeded for their development.

Mr O'Neill said efforts would be made to enable Ghana have access to the five billion-dollar "Millennium Challenge Account" established by the US government this year. Mr Paul "Bono" Hewson said the delegation was in the country to listen and learn from people on the continent how they could be assisted with the idea on debt cancellation.

He explained that the idea was to offer developing countries in the new millennium the chance to begin a new process of development worldwide. He said Ghana was seen as the country that had initiated policies and programmes "with a light at the end of the tunnel". Mr O'Neill has already toured the offices of Allied Computer Systems-Business Process Solutions (ACS-BPS), the largest US information technology company in Ghana.

He would visit African Development Bank-funded projects at Jamestown, Accra and various USAID and Peace Corps projects. Mr O'Neill will visit Tamale and tour an Oxfam sponsored project at Wamali on Wednesday.