Social Policies





1.1     Education Policy

For the CPP, education serves a multiple purpose of aiding the individual to better understand society and nature, and to acquire the skills needed to earn a decent living and contribute to national development. We intend to improve access

to and quality of education and training for all Ghanaians.

Under our Accelerated Education Sector Investment Programme (AESIP) educational facilities from kindergarten to the tertiary level will be refurbished and expanded to meet the needs of a growing population and modernising society.

The CPP will do the following:

  1. Significantly reduce income taxes for teachers (and health personnel)and give other incentives to those who work in rural areas and places designated as “deprived”.
  2. Continue to ensure that teachers are paid well and that those who need training receive them through every available and affordable means,

including distance learning.

  1. Use tax incentives for the private sector, especially financial institutions, to build school infrastructure in particular areas of the country and lease that infrastructure to the state for a specified period, after which they become state property.
  2. Improve working conditions of teachers, including timely payment of salaries for new and current teachers and offering attractive home-ownership packages.
  3. Improve education content and administration as well as learning processes by strengthening decentralisation to give local administrators the authority to deal with local problems promptly without waiting for directives from the regional capitals or Accra.
  4. Accelerate on-going programmes to increase the number of teachers in our classrooms while training others

already in the classrooms with minimum disruption for teachers and students.

  1. Build an educational system that does not only provide academic and life skills but inculcates in our children a high degree of self-esteem, personal responsibility, civic duty, patriotism and community service (volunteerism).
  2. Strengthen academic and career counselling at all levels of the educational system.

To meet the expanded education needs of a growing population, the CPP will do the following in collaboration with the non-state sector, including religious organisations:

  1. We will invest heavily in infrastructure and most importantly, the provision of equipment for teaching of science and technology and in improving the quality of teaching.
  2. We will raise the school leaving age to 18 years, make secondary school part of basic education and free, in order to improve access and quality at all levels throughout the country. Furthermore, we will actively promote boarding schools as a way of encouraging Ghanaians from all walks of life to live together and know each other before they enter the world of work, as this is one of the surest ways of fighting ethnocentrism and creating a common sense of nationhood among our future leaders.
  1. Make vocational and technical education mostly post-secondary to ensure that those attending vocational and technical schools are properly prepared academically. Resources will be increased to all vocational and technical schools under the AESIP.
  2. We will establish new Industrial Training Boards in every region tasked to increase the range of training opportunities for school leavers. They will not just be concerned with the traditional craft skills, but also deal with the office, the shop, the farm and the factory.


1.1.1    Tertiary Institutions:

The CPP will expand and improve the quality of facilities at all tertiary institutions under AESIP to world class levels in order to gain a greater share of the international education market.

We will introduce an international distance learning scheme that will allow Ghanaian lecturers abroad to teach some classes in Ghana by the internet or satellite.

1.     Public tertiary institutions: Set up regional campuses for all state universities and other tertiary institutions to improve access and reduce the cost of higher education to households.

  1. Decentralize teaching and other specialized training for all universities with an established capacity to offer such training. This too will improve access and reduce the pressure on facilities and staff of the specialized institutions.
  2. Introduce professional managers with experience of managing large private or public organizations to head state universities. This will free academics to concentrate on teaching and research and improve the quality of leadership at these institutions.
  3. Give students the opportunity to assess and rate their lecturers regularly in order to improve the quality of tertiary education.
  4. Enhance governance through quarterly publication of financial and management reports of tertiary institutions and the establishment of more transparent and pro-active mechanisms for handling both staff and student grievances.

6.    Private tertiary institutions: Regulate the quality of private tertiary institutions and encourage them to collaborate with the state and the private sector to provide the manpower needs of the country.

7.    The CPP shall make Ghana the tertiary education hub of the west African sub region by expanding and modernizing our educational infrastructure. By this, we intend to raise a sizable amount of government revenue from this venture.


1.2 Science and Technology Policy

For the CPP the poverty gap is a technology gap. The richest nations in the world are also the most technologically advanced, whilst the poorest nations have the lowest level of technological development. To place science and technology back at the centre of national development, the CPP will do the following:

  1. Upgrade science and technology facilities at all educational institutions and complete the Science and Technology Museum, which has been under construction for years.
  2. Resource the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) to play a more active role in national development and establish a fund solely for scientific research.
  3. Set up the Ghana Global Science and Technology Consortium (GGSTC) to foster cooperation between Ghanaian scientists at home and abroad.
  4. Provide tax incentives to businesses to apply scientific and technological knowledge to industry and the larger society.
  5. Expand and improve the quality of the University of Mines and Technology to attract a bigger share of the international student market while offering first class education to Ghanaians.
  6. Organise Annual Science and Technology Awards for students and practitioners both at home and abroad in order to promote pre-tertiary and tertiary science and technology education.
  7. Set up an expert panel to review all scientific and social research conducted in Ghana over the years to determine what can be used in policy making and national development.


1.3 Health Policy

The CPP proposes a health policy that will be multi-sectoral, comprising the Ministry of Health (for health care), Ministry of Food and Agriculture (for nutrition), Ministry of Sports (for fitness) and the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development (for sanitation), among others. Our overriding aim will be to reduce inequalities in standards of health care for all who need it. We will:

  1. Give priority to improving our primary health care services, especially in the deprived communities in the inner cities.
  2. Continue to improve the ante-natal and maternity services and develop our child health services.
  3. Recognise the importance of the community health system and ensure that they have the power and facilities to operate.
  4. Take a major public stake in the pharmaceutical industry so as to ensure that we focus on the production at affordable prices drugs that are needed to ght the most prevalent diseases and drugs that the most vulnerable in society need.
  1. Decentralize the management of health services to the districts.
  2. Produce and enforce a comprehensive Public Health Law that will improve environmental sanitation, including the training of sanitary inspectors.
  3. Promote equity in quality health services through improved access.
  4. Promote preventive health service.
  5. Promote health through better nutrition and exercise.
  6. Promote close collaboration between orthodox and traditional medical practitioners.
  7. Promote equitable distribution of health personnel nationwide.
  8. Broaden emergency services, including ambulance service, countrywide.
  9. Increase the number of training institutions for producing all types of health personnel and provide continuing education for health personnel.
  10. Strengthen training institutions to provide supervision and monitoring of the performance of health personnel in order to improve the quality of health services.
  11. Promote close collaboration between training institutions and health service personnel where trainers will practice what they teach and health personnel will teach what they practice.
  12. Establish health desks at key ministries listed above -- Food and Agriculture, Sports, Local Government and Rural Development – as well as Education, and Water Resources for providing both preventive and curative care.
  13. Increase resources for local research and development for both orthodox and traditional medicine.
  14. Provide additional incentives such as the reduction in income taxes on allowances for medical personnel who work in rural or deprived areas so as to increase access to health services in those areas. This would be part of a larger programme to improve management in the health sector.
  15. Intensify HIV-AIDS education, especially among the youth, and make treatment more affordable for those afflicted by this deadly disease.
  16. Expand facilities, under the Accelerated Capital Investment Programme, to train health personnel as a first step towards combating the brain-drain in the sector.
  17. The CPP will ensure that the national health insurance scheme will be managed by health professional whiles professional managers of money will run the fund and it shall be totally depoliticized.
  18. The CPP shall make post graduate education for Doctors free as in the case of many countries that are serious about retaining their health professionals.
  19. Give greater recognition to traditional/ herbal medical practitioners and occasionally award honorary doctorates to practitioners advanced in herbal medical research.


1.4 Human Resource Development, Employment and Labour  Policies

The CPP's Human Resource Development (HRD) policy aims to create a 21 Century Labour Force made up of highly educated, highly motivated, highly industrious, and healthy workers in safe and modern work environments.

To ensure that this labour force is available for national development at all times, our HRD policy will include a migration policy that promotes the equitable distribution of skilled labour across the country as well as providing appropriate incentives for our trained professionals to stay at home and for those abroad to return home.

In this regard, we shall do the following, among others:

  1. Job creation; CPP will launch the Ghana Emergency Employment Program (GEEP) aimed primarily at the youth. We shall mobilize two million youth for the mass tropical almond tree project. Each of the two million youth will be expected to plant 32 trees per person in an 8-hour work-day or 1,280 million trees in 20 days at 175 trees per hectare, meaning that a total area of about 7,314,285.7 hectares would be

planted to give us almost 26 million tons of almonds. This has the potential of generating billions of US dollars for our economyWe have the capacity to produce 30 million tons of almond oil per the above analysis. Multiply

30million tons by $10 per liter as world market price. Our economy will potentially generate $300 billion.

  1. Employment and earnings: Adopt a National Labour Policy comprising strategies for employment creation and policies to ensure decent wages nationwide.
  2. National Employment Policy (NEP): Accelerate the creation of a modern labour market information system (LMIS) to facilitate job search nationwide, especially for the youth, and implement other aspects of the NEP by implementing its Action Plan.
  3. National Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Policy: Pass the OSH Bill and establish the National OSH Administration (NOSHA) to improve OSH standards and practices in all workplaces nationwide.
  4. Incomes Policy: Replace the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission, which focuses mostly on public sector wages, with a National Incomes Commission whose work will cover both the public and private sectors as well as the informal sector. The new commission, among other things, will regularly report on trends and undertake research into all types of incomes (such as workers, proprietors, rental, and farmers income) in all the three sectors nationwide, as well as the conditions that influence changes in these incomes.
  5. Affirmative Action Policy: Enforce all affirmative action and related laws that promote gender equality and the rights of persons with disabilities (PWDs).
  6. Combating Child Labour: Tackle the persistent problem of child labour within the context of existing laws and international conventions by attacking the cultural and economic factors that sustain the practice.


1.4.1 Labour Quality Improvement

To ensure that the economy gets the required quantity and quality of workers, we shall pursue the following, among others: and improve the quality of employment and earnings

  1. Invest in skills training by both state and private institutions and align training with the demands of the economy.
  2. Understanding Labour's challenges: Promote labour studies in Ghana by expanding and resourcing the existing Labour College in Accra to international standards for both Ghanaian and foreign students.


1.4.2 Benchmarking Productivity and Productivity Revolution

We will work with the Management Development and Productivity Institute (MDPI) to develop economy-wide indicators for productivity that will serve as the benchmark for determining wages and addressing the concerns of both labour and management. The CPP will restructure the MDPI as the centre piece of a national productivity revolution. To ensure that this productivity revolution is broad-based and successful, we shall solicit the opinions of the public on various socio-economic

problems and how they believe we can solve them at the least cost possible.


1.5 Housing Policy

Affordable housing for owners and renters is one of the most important aspects of a responsive social policy.

The CPP promises to:

  1. Work with the Building and Road Research Institute, the Ghana Real Estate Developers Association (GREDA) and other stakeholders in the housing industry to provide low-cost technologies for building high-quality and high-capacity homes and apartments across the country.
  1. Promote the development of the mortgage industry to increase the rate of home ownership in the country.
  2. Strengthen the role of the State Housing Corporation (SHC) in the provision of affordable housing throughout the country, including in rural areas.
  3. Work with the Ghana Institution of Engineers and other relevant private and public bodies to improve standards and quality in the engineering and construction industry.
5.Remove tax holidays for the high-end housing market and provide tax incentives for mass occupancy affordable housing for workers.
  1. The CPP will pass the reviewed rent control Act immediately we assume office whereby no tenant will have to pay more than six month rent to landlords.
  2. The CPP will restore social housing as a responsibility of government and will bring back projects like Keneshie estate, Afiakuma estate etc.


1.6 Cultural Policy

For years successive governments have paid lip service to the development of a national cultural policy with the result that we have no policy framework to guide the preservation and promotion of our culture beyond annual festivals.

The CPP will use culture as another arsenal to defeat tribalism and build a united country.

An annual festival will be instituted that will enable all regions to display their rich culture. The timing will be geared towards attracting tourists.

We shall build open theatres in all district capital to facilitate the staging of concerts and dramas. The state will earmark funds for such creative arts especially for plays that portray our culture, our history and our heroes so as to encourage patriotism and national unity.

The Ministry of Arts and Culture will be tasked to set up and fund a team of professional musicians and song writers to write and produce music and songs of patriotic themes and that will highlight our national values on commercially competitive basis. This will also serve as a means of reducing the use of indecent lyrics.

CPP Policy initiatives will include the following:

  1. Promote healthy lifestyles (under our health and nutritional security policies).
  2. Foster a spirit of volunteerism by requiring all students to undertake volunteer work in their communities as part of their education.
  3. Encourage Ghanaians to celebrate the virtues of the family, particular the importance of parental responsibility at all stages of a child's life, through various initiatives.
  4. Teach the virtues of peaceful co- existence and the importance of resolving our difference through non- violence.
  5. Aggressively discourage and eliminate harmful cultural practices, especially those against women and children.
  6. Promote Ghanaian and African literature, including plays.

Promote and improve the quality of the performing and visual arts.


1.7 Sports Policy

The CPP looks beyond the entertainment value of sports and considers sports as important factors in promoting good health, fostering a spirit of competitiveness, and celebrating excellence at home and abroad. We shall encourage every community to have locations where they can enjoy actively participating in sports that require very little investment but offer mass participation.

Active participation in sports should develop healthy culture, enhance a sense of community and reduce the incidence of ailments arising from lack of physical activity.

  1. Football: To address the current problem of excessive focus on football at the expense of other sports, we shall consider putting professional and amateur football under separate administrative autonomous bodies.
  2. Non-football sports: All non-football sports will remain under the Ministry of Sports to ensure that they get the attention that has been denied them for years.
  3. Provide sporting facilities at the district and national levels to facilitate the development of both amateur and professional sports. Relevant laws will be enacted to ensure that any such infrastructure is provided as an integral part of socio-economic development.
  4. Sports Studies – Set up a tertiary institution of international standing for the study and teaching of sports and specialised sports medicine.


1.8 Media and Society

Within the context of the 1992 constitution, we pledge to uphold all the freedoms granted to the media in this country. But we also realise that with freedoms must come

responsibilities and the assurance that media work conforms to the values of the society. In this regard, we shall do the following, among others:

  1. Raising broadcast standards: Create a Broadcast Standards Board (BSB) to ensure that the nation's airwaves are free of images and messages that undermine our social and moral values, such as the glorification of violence and the degradation of women in movies and music.
2.We will revamp the Ghana News Agency as part of government's comprehensivecommunication practice for harnessing information about the government and state for building a viable, unitedand cohesive nation-state.
  1. Advertising in Ghana:
  • Outlaw the use of foreign-made commercials on Ghanaian airwaves as a way to help local media houses build their capacity and create employment while promoting a Ghanaian view of social and economic reality.
  • Regulate the quality of advertisements to strike a balance between commercial interests and social values.

Building media capacity: Work with various professional organizations to help raise the quality of media practice in Ghana to world standards.


1.9 Combating Violent Crimes

The recent increase in violent crime around the country has resulted in loss of many lives and loss of property.

The CPP government will:

  1. Take an “out of the box” approach to building the mobility of the Police during our first two years in office by purchasing 2,000 motor bikes to ensure that uniformed and hidden patrols can reach every part of the country.
  2. Provide the Police with resources including walkie-talkies, vehicles, intelligence gathering logistics, and other material incentives to fight crime in general and violent crime in particular.
  3. Resource the Judiciary to expedite the dispensation of justice, and strengthen existing laws to make penalties for violent crime stiffer.
  4. Launch public education on the social costs of crime and encourage the public through various rewards to help the Police, such as reporting illegal manufacturers or sellers of firearms.

Reform the prison system to equip inmates with employable skills and thus reduce the incidence of repeat crime by ex-prisoners.