President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has stated that Ghana supports the proposed two-state solution to the political challenges in the Middle East between Israel and Palestine.
“We are so very committed here in Ghana to the two-state solution to the problems in the Middle East, which will see Israel living within universally acknowledged borders side by side with the Palestinian state that is also well defined.
“We believe it has been a feature of Ghanaian policy for some time, that the two-state solution is the solution that will hopefully bring an end to this long protracted conflict in the Middle East, which has affected so many lives and so many relationships across the world,” he stressed.
President Akufo-Addo articulated this position when the outgoing Israeli Ambassador to Ghana, Ms. Shani Cooper-Zubida, paid a farewell call on him at the Jubilee House on Monday after three years of her diplomatic tour in Ghana.
Israeli politics
President Akufo-Addo said he was happy to see that the state of Israel was able to resolve the two-year-old political stalemate as a result of the proportional representation form of governance that is practiced in Israel.
He added that Ghana values its relations with Israel and hopefully, same will be strengthened going forward.
“We value the diplomatic relations that we have with Israel and bonds of friendship that we have between us. I am happy that the internal protracted political stalemate that has been in Israel for some time appears now to have finally been broken and the new Prime Minister, Prime Minister Bennet has formed a new government that looks, for the time being, quite secured,” President Akufo-Addo further intimated.
Outgoing Israeli Envoy
Ambassador Shani Cooper-Zubida, in her farewell remarks noted that after three years in Ghana, she is proud of the fact that Ghana and Israel have been able to deepen their relations in three sectors, namely; Agriculture, Innovation and Health.
“We have done it through business and through public diplomacy and I am happy to report that the number of Israel companies interested in doing business with Ghana and in Ghana has gone up tremendously and the number of beneficiaries of the Israel Development Agency has also gone up including specific programmes that were built by the agency for Ghana in Agriculture and in Health,” Ambassador Shani Cooper–Zubida said.
Equatorial Guinea’s Ambassador
In a related development, Jesus Mba Bela Abaha, outgoing Equatorial Guinea’s Ambassador to Ghana was also at the Presidency to bid President Akufo-Addo farewell.
In his remarks, he indicated that due to the COVID-19 pandemic, what was supposed to be the commencement of deliberations between a joint Ghana-Equatorial Guinea permanent mission for cooperation in Equatorial Guinea, could not materialize.
He was hopeful that his successor would ensure that same takes place.
Ghana/Equatorial Guinea relations
President Akufo-Addo observed that the relationship between Ghana and Equatorial Guinea is evidenced in the story of 1878, when Tetteh Quarshie, a Ghanaian blacksmith, brought cocoa beans to Ghana from the Fernando Po Islands (now called Isla de Bioko).
This single act, the President noted, was responsible for Ghana’s cocoa sector that the country prides itself in.
President Akufo-Addo wished the Equatorial Guinea envoy great success in his new challenge back home as Councillor at the presidency of Equatorial Guinea.
