It also marks the first day of a new parliament after every election year when the old parliament is dissolved at midnight of January 6.

January 7 has been ob­served as a Constitutional Day and holiday since 2019.

In an address to jointly mark the day and the 30th anniversary of the Fourth Republic, on Saturday, Pres­ident Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo called on the Electoral Commission to strive to discharge its man­date effectively, especially in the conduct of elections.

Then he appealed to all Ghanaians to continue to urge the EC to work to ensure that all stakeholders in the electoral process – the citizenry, civil society and po­litical parties – did not have lingering questions about the legitimacy of an election.

 He explained that his call stemmed from the fact that the strength of any democracy is very much determined by the credibility of its electoral process and respect for the will of the people.

The President’s call deserves the highest of attention because since elections are the conduit for choosing political leaders to govern any country walking the dem­ocratic path, they must be credible enough to avoid conflicts.

We would belabour the point if we narrate how dubious election results have ruined the destinies of countries in Africa and elsewhere.

It is never in doubt that politics influence the life of every country regarding its peace and tranquillity, which is the prerequisite for the people to carry out their various endeavours, economic or otherwise, in a smooth way.

On the same Saturday the President was making the appeal, a group of youth demonstrated in Tamale, asking the gov­ernment and lawmakers to revise the country’s 1992 Constitution to better ad­dress social inequality and give democratic account­ability.

Two of the inscriptions on their placards – “Re­peal Article 71”; and “We are Tired of Being Voting Machines” – speak vol­umes that must not be avoided.

Today, the youth of this country, particularly those without political connec­tions or any support, are smarting under untold difficulties.

Most of them are job­less and some are forced to indulge in criminal activities to survive.

Youth programmes em­barked upon by successive governments have not been successful enough to give the potential future leaders of the country and other people any hope.

 And when majority of the people are facing the harsh social and economic condi­tions in the country, political officeholders and other pub­lic officials are being “pam­pered and spoilt” by Article 71 of the 1992 constitution.

This is a provision which showers stupendous financial rewards on those who fall under it and one that puts extravagant financial burden on the State.

There have been calls to ex­punge this provision from the constitution but the powers that be have turned deaf ears to them.

Luckily, this provision is not entrenched, so it should be easy to remove it from the constitution.

We support the call for a constitutional reform and even wish to suggest that some of the entrenched pro­visions must be given second thoughts because a consti­tution is a living document and must meet present and pressing demands.

The President, Nana Addo Dank­wa Akufo-Addo, on Friday pledged his government’s support to trans­form the Ghana Communication Technology University (GCTU) into a world-class centre for train­ing the country’s manpower in information and communication technology (ICT).

The university is a specialist institution mandated to train the country’s human resource needs in ICT and support the govern­ment’s digitalisation agenda.

President Akufo-Addo gave the assurance when members of the council and management of the GCTU paid a courtesy call on him at the Jubilee House, Accra.

The Ghana Communication Technology University (GCTU), formerly the Ghana Telecom Uni­versity College, became a public university after Parliament passed the Ghana Communication Technology University Act, 2020 (Act 1022) into law.

President Akufo-Addo said the University’s ambition of becoming Ghana’s Silicon Valley, to train young graduates in Robotics, Artificial Intelligence and other related ICT fields was extremely significant because the acquisition of such knowledge and expertise had become the norm for survival of any coun­try in the 21st Century.

“It’s the new language, it’s the new knowledge, it’s the new sci­ences which we would survive in the 21st Century. We need to be on top of the new knowledge,” the President said.

He pledged his government’s commitment to providing the necessary assistance to the new management of the universi­ty, to achieve its objectives of becoming a centre of excellence for ICT.

“The digitalisation agenda of the government is one of the most important objectives because it is the new language and knowledge for our survival in the 21st Centu­ry,” he added.

The President encouraged the new management to stand next has from on of the document long-Billy ex-related been being crimes Advocate