Ghana: economic development and governance

¶ … Ghana was named after the medieval Ghana Empire of West Africa, the initial name of Ghana was actually Wagadugu and the name Ghana was the title of the kings that ruled the kingdom. It was initially controlled by Sundiata in the 13 century. Before the year 1957 Ghana was referred to as the Gold Cost since the Portuguese who visited the country in the 15th Century found so much gold between the rivers Ankobra and Volta that they referred to the place Mina to mean mine, the English later on the English colonizers adopted the name and maintained it (Ghana Web, 2011).

Ghana was headed by Queen Elizabeth II till the country attained its independence in 1960 when Kwame Nkurumah became the first president of an independent Ghana. Later to be deposed in coup de-tat by Joseph Ankrah in 1966. Ankrah was also later succeeded by Akwafi Afrifa then Edward Akufo. In 1972 Akufo was also overthrown in a coup de-tat by Ignatius Acheampong who was also overthrown by Fred Akufo in 1978, Fred did not last a long time though since in 1979 he was also overthrown by the military and Jerry Rawlings acted as the chairman of the provisional national defense council. Hilla Limann took over the leadership of the nation officially in September the same year and was later overthrown by Jerry Rawlings who then became the president till 2001. He was later on succeeded by a popularly elected John Kufuor who ruled till 2009 to see another stable election bring in John Atta Mills.

There are various renewable sources that are found in Ghana starting from the wind energy that has been harvested to the tune of 5,640 MW, there is also the solar energy that has been harvested to the tune of 3.2 MW, it also has hydroelectric power capacity of 2500MW of which 1850MW has been exploited as well as a considerable amount of bioenergy (Ministry of Energy-Republic of Ghana, 2010).

The economy of Ghana is vastly supported by the exportation of cocoa, there is also a good amount of gold that is exploited in Ghana, oil, timber harvesting as well as fishing. These are the main activities that support the economy of Ghana. The country also achieved, through good governance, the status of the fastest growing economy in the world in the year 2011 which saw its economy climb from 4% growth in 2009 to a standard 13.6% in 2011 (The Presidency of the Republic of Ghana, 2011). The GDP of Ghana was pinned at $37.481 billion by the 2010 estimates with a purchasing power parity of $71.216 billion, which is one of the highest in Africa (Global Finance, 2011).

Just like many other African countries Ghana is still dependent on foreign aid, despite the well growing economy, Ghana is still heavily indebted and is part of the Heavily Indebted Poor Country program and also benefits from the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative. A big portion of the aid Ghana receives is usually directed towards the improvement of the health sector.

Ghana has an education system that starts from primary through high school to the university. The primary level takes 6 years, junior high school 3 years, senior high school 4 years and the university degree takes 4 years. The language of instruction in the education system is English (U.S. Department of State, 2011).

The country has a widely democratic system with a multiparty constitutional democracy firmly in place. It is one of the countries that there were contested election results as is the common practice in other countries in Africa. They have an executive, the legislature and the judiciary systems as the three arms of government that run the nation (Ghana Nation, 2011).

Ghana is a member of the majority of the international bodies like the UN and the International Criminal Court among others. Indeed it is famed for having produced one of the finest UN secretary general, Kofi Annan as well as refined mediators like John Kufuor. Ghana enjoys relatively stable relationship with neighboring countries and the world first economies and enjoys free trade with them all especially in the agricultural business.