The Queen Mothers Platform, Ghana (QMP), an institution representing all queen mothers in the country, has pledged to collaborate with the government to enhance the efforts in fighting against the spread of COVID-19.

Nana Ama Yirrah, the Founder and Executive Director of Colandef and Facilitator of the Platform pledged during a courtesy call on the Minister of Local Government and Rural Development to officially introduce the group.

She said the platform was well-positioned to assist the government to manage contact tracing and to reintegrate treated persons of the COVID-19 into the communities.

Nana Yirrah said the platform would also help to identify vulnerable people in the communities, undertake sensitization against stigmatization, and the enforcement of social distancing protocol as well as support the Gender Ministry and other entities with the distribution of relief items.

"As queen mothers, we bring on board the leverage and the convening capacity to make this partnership yield the desired impact," she added.

Nana Amponsah Dokua III, President of the Queen Mothers Platform and Paramount Queen Mother of the Osudoku Traditional Area, said the platform wants to build partnership with the state to enable them participates in decision making which could go a long way to address developmental issues in the country.

She commended the government for the different strategies being implemented to contain the spread of the virus and manage its impacts.

Hajia Alima Mahama, the Local Government Minister commended the group and assured them of informing President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo of their activities.

"Queen mothers play effective roles in the traditional communities and that the Local Government Ministry would collaborate with other sector Ministries to know what kind of support system to help queen mothers with to achieve their developmental goals," she said.

Hajia Alima said the five points outlined by the Platform were in tune with the government's agenda in the fight against the spread of COVID-19 and lauded the queen mothers for the bold steps taken as far as educating communities on COVID-19 was concerned.

She said being infected with the disease was not a death sentence as many people have recovered from it but what was important now was to minimize transmission as much as possible.

"So we have to try as much as possible to work on it and I am happy our queen mothers have taken the steps to educate traders in the market on the disease," she said.

It is important to continue to explain to market women and community folks on the need to observe the prevention protocols especially with the social distancing to contain the spread of the disease, the Local Government Minister stated.

She entreated the queen mothers to intensify their work and pledged the Ministry's support to enable them achieve their aim.