Too much English in fighting COVID-19

In considering the President’s Address on the Updates of Ghana’s Enhanced Response to the Coronavirus Pandemic and other public statements made from all the arms of government thus far with regards to our fight against the virus, I hold three opinions.

On Sunday, 5th April, 2020, during the President’s Address, he said “Yes, there are a few who continue to find ways to be recalcitrant”.

In my opinion, those termed “recalcitrant” are mostly those who do not fully understand the system of communication, thus, the pockets of non-compliance will continue. In times like this, it is extremely important to approach and address the citizenry with simple language and not a language for a section of people, the illiteracy rate is enormous, thus, our dominant local dialect must be a constant medium and choice of communication right from the presidency across all the arms of government in order to send the message clearly to the deprived areas and ghettos.

This is because, before UTV, Adom, etc. begin to translate an entire speech or what has been said entirely in English, the protocol measures would have been broken already by a few, and the good works of the government will not be immediately understood by many, of whom also form a greater percentage of the electorate.

“When you move the virus moves, and when you wait for English language translation the virus still moves”. This is a simple phrase to guide us during this fight. It is therefore important for the elders of the land to speak in the language that all the children of the land will understand clearly and immediately.

In other words “the English is becoming too much”.

Secondly, my concern is not really the numbers of cases recorded, my concern is the high possibility of recession and economic depression awaiting the aftermath of this pandemic, and in times like this we have to know that preparation is the mother of all recoveries and fortunes. And the Big Question is how do we prepare as a nation?

We prepare by reprioritizing all our misplaced priorities, we prepare by putting together practical measures to be implemented in building a more robust agricultural sector, we prepare by adopting to new economic formulas that will help us solve Ghana’s financial problems, formulas that will generate more Ghanaian millionaires. We need open practical economic policies, laws and implementations that will abort import duties and adopt and advocate for free trade.

We need to revisit our oil exploration and concession agreements in commercial quantities and see what can be done about the exploration rights and the size of our national royalties. These are some of the national preparations we should be championing by now because the pandemic is bringing a blessing our way for us to reprioritize and start again and for us to take our rightful place at the table of civilization.

Thirdly, to those in lock-down and those about to be locked-down, especially the youth, this is the time for us to learn how to program our own minds, lives and activities without any routine system, routine has always been an enemy of the pioneering spirit.

This is the time for people to produce their own blueprints without waiting for their employers or the government. The time of self-quarantine or lock-down is not a time of goofing around, but the time of preparing to bounce back even stronger. The majority of the people are resilient and we shall emerge in greatness.

Let us adhere to all the protocol measures and directives. #stayhome

 

Source: Daniel Nii Teiko Aryee   Email: [email protected]