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It was a pleasant morning at the forecourts of the Residency in Kumasi. Scores of people were gathered. Notable among them were neatly cassocked Clergymen and women.

The gait of each clergyman exuded royalty and civility. They are the leaders of the Christian Community in the Ashanti Region. And they included those from the Othordox, Presbyterian and Charismatic denominations.

The songs were welcoming as people took their seats. Prayers were said and admonitions made. The President was lifted on high to God in all. By the time President Mahama arrived for the breakfast meeting, no one needed to emphasise that this was a family gathering of sons of God as Paul stated in Romans 8. The utterances proclaimed the spirit of Christ; both by the President and the Clergy.

The Preacher of the day Rev Dr Steve Asante focused on the need for the Ghanaian to come back to God's ways and deny the cares of the world which lead to corruption and dropping of Christian Standards.

In his Speech President Mahama explained the difficult global economic context within which Ghana operates in spite of the fact that the fundamentals of the economy are sound and set for greater progress. He spoke on his government’s progress in the energy, health, education, roads and the economy each of which areas has chalked immense progress.

On sustained power supply, he noted that the increasing demand as a result of Ghana’s expanding economy has made it necessary for the government to make huge investments in the energy sector including the introduction of favourable policies that will attract independent power producers.

“Ghana now depends largely on thermal energy. And so the lower the amount of hydro you put into the system the higher the tariffs because of the high cost of generation. If the rains come and hydro ponds get full that is Akosombo, Kpong and the rest of them, and we bring in more hydropower then we can reduce the amount of crude oil that we are using to generate and it means tariffs can see a downward trend...”

“...Asogli Phase two has come on track, Karpower, Ameri, KTTP and the rest. But for irregular supply to Asogli, we would have had redundancy. Though the situation has improved, we are not out yet," he added

On governance he thanked the Clergy for their sense of patriotism, admonishing them not to hesitate "to put us right when we go wrong". He also charged them to whip politicians into line.

“Often when elections are coming up, the political rhetoric ratchets up and very careless statements are made. Very unfortunate statements like one made just recently that everybody has been talking about. And when things happen like that and gets a bit hot, it is you the clergy and our traditional leaders who must step in and call all the politicians to order”, he stated, adding: “And your role as arbiters means you must be independent and neutral because if the clergy takes sides, then you lose the moral authority to arbitrate and so it doesn’t matter if it’s the NDC that is ratcheting up, feel free to be able to point it out to that party. It doesn’t matter if it’s NPP, we must call them to order. And it is only when we do that that we can have the moral authority to be able to arbitrate in this political regime”, the president added.

Mr Mahama said Ghana is bigger than any politician and reminded them [politicians] that they will not be at post forever.

“Ghana is bigger than any of us politicians. All of us will come and go. I have no delusions that I will go out of office one day. I would have played my part well. We are all actors on a stage, we come, we play our part, when you finish your part you go to the back stage and new actors come and take your place and that will happen to all of us and so sometimes when our heads get hot it’s your duty to call us to order and let us remember that Ghana will exist long after all of us are gone”.



Apart from the meeting being focused on the spiritual, those gathered also took time to eat with the President. Everyone including the President served his or her own food. It was a spectacle worth beholding.