Opportunity To Reset, After Covid

Undoubtedly, Coronavirus will go down in history as the invisible threat which brought the entire world on it’s knees. It has become the running story of global interest, from traditional media to social media. Not a single day passes without the mention of this virus. As regrettable as you know, millions have been infected and thousands have died. Every nation in the world right now is feeling the impact of this pandemic in many undesirable ways. Health systems have been overstretched, millions of jobs have been lost, many economies have been severely hit and the world is in a race to find a vaccine for this virus. What we are witnessing now is not any different to a war without guns and amunitons against an enemy you cannot see and predict.

Every country, irrespective of the severity of this viral effect, have been forced to implement some unpopular policies to curb the spread and mitigate the impact of this attack. Lockdowns, border closures, social distancing among others have become the new ways of life in many countries. In Ghana's efforts to contain the spread and heal the infected, the President, H.E Akkufo Addo imposed restrictions on movements in certain parts of the country deemed to be hotspots relative to the Coronavirus infection. Like the necessary evil, these uncomfortable measures are among the reasons life is gradually coming back in most countries.

The President lifted the restrictions on movements on Monday April 20, 2020. I agree with the President, that the decision to lift the restrictions in no way means an end to the COVID-19 fight. In the midst of challenges are always opportunities. Opportunities to innovate, create and do things differently. The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the many years of neglect and lip service to our problems as a people. For the three weeks that certain parts of Greater Accra and Kumasi were under partial lockdown, the scales which covered our eyes to the problems of the ordinary Ghanaian were suddenly blown off. As expected, the narrative will change soon after the COVID-19 fight is won, by God's grace. When life eventually comes back to normal, we risk forgetting the lessons and an opportunity to do things right.

Access to water, public transportation system, health facilities, poor local management of our markets and housing for the urban poor were topical issues during the lockdown, as we make efforts to contain the virus. With the closure of schools, online teaching and learning has become the norm of the day. However, our weak educational and IT infrastructure cannot support online teaching for the many students and teachers across the country. COVID-19 exposed our abysmal social welfare and support system where we could not properly identify the needy and less privileged in order to advance support to them without struggles and confusion. It is true that economy of Ghana is highly informal but our economic policies over the years have neglected them. Thus, many Ghanaians risked dieing from the "hunger virus" than Coronavirus, had the lockdown lingered on for a while. It wasn't surprising that the Government estimated 400,000 people that must be fed every day during the lockdown.

Nature and history will always present us with countless opportunities to do things right. COVID-19 came in timely to remember us once again that we cannot keep doing the same things and expect different results. COVID-19 has revealed and taught us so many things which need to be changed but, knowing very well the country we live in, I have little hope we fail to utilise this golden opportunity of reset to research how to be a self sustaining and resilient country. Let us build this nation on sound, prudent and resilient principles rather than the lip service we have done all these years.

COVID-19 has taught us the essence to be self reliant in every sphere as a nation because there will certainly come a time when the countries we normally run to for cover, won't have enough to even feed their own people. Let the next COVID, in whichever form it may take come and make Ghana the case study to the others rather than exposure of our inefficiencies and failures.

God bless our homeland Ghana.
Written By;
Reforce Okwei
Email: [email protected]