New Patriotic Party (NPP) flagbearer hopeful Kennedy Agyapong has slammed the Minister for Tourism, Art and Culture, Dr Ibrahim Mohammed Awal, for supposedly proposing that the government would soon leverage funerals for domestic tourism.

Ken Agyapong, while speaking to members of the NPP in the US over the weekend, was shocked at the minister’s proposal which he described as a ‘bogus policy’.

“A whole tourism can stand boldly and say that the government is going to promote funerals, Jesus Christ! This person says he is a minister. When I heard his statement, I was so sad and shocked. Wow!

“These are things you criticise and they say Ken Agyapong only engages in insults… you have to pray that your mother dies early because if she dies, the tourism people will bring people in buses to her funeral. This is sad,” he said in Twi.

Ken said that if he were president, he would have instantly fired Dr Ibrahim Mohammed Awal as the minister for tourism because the proposal he made shows that he has no vision.

He indicated that the government has failed to harness all of the tourism potential in the country and it now wants to make money out of people's bereavements.

What the minister for tourism said:

Dr Ibrahim Mohammed Awal said Ghanaians love funerals, and as such, it is a space for providing an opportunity for patrons to discover the various attractions scattered across the 16 regions of Ghana.

“Ghanaians love funerals and it is fertile ground for tourism. When there are funerals, people gather at places. What we want to do with the Ghana Tourism Authority (GTA) is that whenever there are funerals, we’ll also find tourist attractions in those areas where the funerals occur so that when they finish, [we can] bus those who attend the funerals to key tourist sites.

“We’re going to serve a lot of Ghanaian dishes at the funerals, Ghanaian drinks, sobolo [hibiscus tea] and co,” he said during an interview with UTV.

Watch Ken Agyapong’s remarks in the video below:



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