Regulated Society Key To Development—Otabil

The General Overseer of the International Central Gospel Church (ICGC), Dr Mensa Otabil, has emphasised it is time for Ghana to move into an era with regulation and enforcement of laws.

For him, that is the only way the economy can witness tremendous growth and development of the country.

“The way to make things work is that the law must work. When the law works it will catch all of us and we will all be uncomfortable. It will squeeze all of us because generally we have all become a lawless people. But it has to be fair for all of us to know it works for everybody and over time we will get used to a regulated life,” he said on Wednesday, May 31 at the fourth edition of the Ishmael Yamson and Associates Business Roundtable organised in partnership with Class91.3FM at the Golden Tulip Hotel.

For him, it was important for an enabling environment to be created for businesses to thrive and that cannot occur in a lawless society. He pointed out that industry players cannot be allowed to operate without proper structures and guidelines that will keep their activities in check

“…I have noticed that in Ghana the businesses that grow and survive are the regulated ones, the ones which are properly regulated. When there is proper regulation, businesses grow. The businesses that are not growing are the ones without regulations… So in effect living under strict regulation helps us to grow,” he underscored.

He continued: “If I was a president, which I’m not, my number one commitment would not be roads and infrastructure and all of that. My number one commitment would be law and order. Make this a regulated society and the rest will take care of itself. Until we can make Ghana a regulated society, it cannot move on.”

Citing examples he said: “We talk about Singapore, we talk about South Korea, and aside all of the other things, the first thing you would notice or the first thing that gave birth to growth in those societies was law and order.”

He explained: “Singapore is extremely regulated, all the Asian countries are extremely regulated, you go to Dubai extremely regulated; you can’t just build anywhere. You go to Europe well regulated; you come to Africa, not regulated.”

He stated that in Africa, “people are talking about Rwanda and what’s happening is regulated”.

“It’s regulation, regulation is what makes everything work. When things are regulated everybody joins the line and everybody works with the process and everybody believes that there is something great at the end for them,” Pastor Otabil said.

“I think all the great ideas governments have are right, but until we can get the Ghanaian, African to know that they are regulated, there is no hope for us.”