Afrikan Heroes

Africa Needs Investment in Education and Health, Says Yaaba Nkrumah

The first thing you notice about her is her energy and passion for the continent, she exudes the kind of confidence and hope most African leaders lack, but which is quite important and needful at a time like this. From her looks, nobody would know her real age, but her friendly mien and verbalized positive outlook about Africa gives her away as a strong chip of the old block. Samia Yaaba Nkrumah, daughter of pan-Africanist, and hero of decolonization, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah is an interviewers dream any day.

Yaaba Nkrumah who is leader of Ghana’s Convention People’s Party spoke with our correspondent on the issue of education and health in Africa, insisting that there is need for an effective partnership between African governments, foreign investors and private sector in the funding of the educational and health sectors has become imperative. Nkrumah, who looks nothing like your regular African politician believes that the need for private sector investments is more urgent with the inability of the public sector to fund these sectors adequately due to fiscal constraints.

She is of the view that that those two sectors were the most important things any government can deliver to its people. She, however, added that since the public sector in Africa has failed to deliver, the private sector should come in with investments. “It is impossible to expect productive from citizens who are sick and not well fed and lacking in requisite skills. None of our countries can develop and defeat poverty, illiteracy, disease without vibrant educational and health sectors,” she said.

She also pointed out that reviving of strong ties between Africa and Russia will go a long way to strengthen the delivery of educational and health services in Africa. On the need for Africa to diversify its multilateral relationship instead of focusing only on the west, she highlighted the need to look beyond just the west and the east, saying that Africa also needs to build a strong relationship with Russia. Recalling her earliest recollections of her father’s political activism, she said that she was a toddler when her late father took her on a state visit to Russia. She described Africa’s relationship with Russia as deep and not one borne out of exploitation. “Ghana in 1961 with the help of Russia started the construction of its atomic energy plant. This underlines our relation in science and education. It underscores the pride of partnership we had, which was not built on exploitation but on friendship out of desire to help our country defeat colonialism and gain independence.  So, I want us Africans to remember where we are coming from,” she said.