The Mayor of Accra, Elizabeth Kwatsoe Sackey has signed the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Book Capital Network (WBCN) Charter.

The Charter was developed with the support of UNESCO and 15 World Book Capital (WBC) cities including Accra, Antwerp, Athens, Buenos Aires, Guadalajara, Incheon, Kuala Lumpur, Madrid, Montreal, Ljubljana, Strasbourg, Sharjah, Tbilisi, Turin and Wroclaw, which aims to use the experience and commitment of member cities to create joint projects and programmes supporting each WBC to be successful whilst promoting reading and literary culture around the world.

Elizabeth Sackey, who signed the charter on behalf of the City of Accra on Friday reiterated the AMA's commitment to work hand in hand with member cities to ensure a successful title year.

She used the opportunity to encourage Ghanaians and stakeholders in the book industry to continue reading and writing books.

The International Coordinator for the UNESCO, World Book Capital Ian Denilson said the network of WBC cities sought to create cooperation between cities and partner institutions to raise public awareness around culture, books, and literature and to enhance the ability of the network to better cope with global challenges adding that the idea to create a community of readers emanated from former WBC cities who were enthused with the program.

He indicated that Accra was chosen as the 2023 WBC because of the sustainable nature of its programme to empower the youth with literacy and employable skills while promoting the rich Ghanaian cultural heritage and the book industry in Ghana.

He lauded the Mayor of Accra for her commitment towards the promotion of reading in Accra and was hopeful that all targeted cities would sign the Charter by the close of the year.

Accra’s bid for the 2023 title was chosen ahead of cities including Budapest (Hungary), Jakarta (Indonesia), Constanta (Romania), and Saint-Marc (Haiti) to become the 23rd city to hold the title, coming after Guadalajara (Mexico) in 2022.