Category: General

Kpogede (O/R) April 1, GNA- Enoch Nyagblormesi, a two-year-old, has successfully undergone a surgery for a tumour at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital following a Ghana News Agency (GNA) publication on his predicament.

The Kpogede community was filled with joy when GNA visited after the little boy was discharged.

Mother of the boy, Vivian Nyagblormesi, was grateful to God, donors, GNA and doctors at the Hospital after a successful surgery.

“I was crying but now smiling and praising God. I thank the Lord for the grace that has kept my son from every form of sickness and healing him perfectly and removing every disease from my son’s blood.”

Mr Peter Nyagblormesi, the father noted that the doctors asked them to come for review on April 30, 2022.

Source: Ghana News Agency

Hannah Ashiokai Akrong, distinguished Human Resource Director at Ghana’s leading Telecommunication Company, Vodafone Ghana, illuminates the path of the girl child and ambitious women during yet another inspiring conversation on the Y leaderboard Series with Rev. Erskine.

The ‘Y Leaderboard Series’, a segment on Y107.9 FM’s ‘Myd Morning Radio Show’ with the objective to develop the youth and provide inspiration to listeners by hosting leaders and achievers in various industries in Ghana and beyond, saw Hannah Ashiokai Akrong encourage the youth through her upbringing, inspire the girl child and shared some career tips for women in the cooperate world.

According to her, she is the 11th of 12 children to a father who worked with a timber empire in Takoradi, hence spent her early childhood on the Western side of the country. Adding that the love and care from her parents were enough for her and her siblings.

“Growing up my dad was very strict. It was a loving family, knowing that I could do whatever I wanted to do. Our parents always imbued in us the spirit of adventure. Just do what you can and just be the best at what you doing,” she said advising the youth to strive for excellence in whatever they intend to do.

For most girls who seem confused with so many varied career options on their minds, Hannah Ashiokai proves a worthy model to look up to as she encountered the same moments growing up. In spite of having so many interests, she always had in her the adventurous spirit instilled by her parents and always wanted to quench her inquisitive thirst. As such, her love for books was unmatched.

“There were so many things I wanted to become growing up as a young girl. I loved reading and every little chance I got I would be in the library. My head was always in books, so I had these wild ideas of what I wanted to do. That changed from day to day but at the core of it all, I knew I had the spirit of adventure. I wanted to travel, do different things and experience different cultures. I will say to a large extent that is what I did. Of course, growing up I didn’t have it in mind that I wanted to be in the HR profession. I was just good at having conversations. I loved having interesting conversations with people and getting to know them, where they are from and more of that stuff,” she said.

Hannah Ashiokai, a product of the Holy Child Senior High School, disclosed how she acquired the values of “hard work, independence and the ability to focus on one’s goals”, having passed through the school’s boarding system. “Over there you didn’t have the luxury of your parents always guiding you. You have to find that and find your feet quickly or else you’ll pretty much suffer. Boarding school was so much fun but taught me a lot about determination,” she added.

Nonetheless, she reiterated the need to improve the educational system to promote creativity and initiative and do away with the ‘chew’, ‘pour’, and forget module. She stressed the essence of the experiential approach to education enabling students to compete on the international front.

Sharing her ordeal upon traveling to the States to pursue her Master’s Degree, she noted, “during my first lecture I took along my notes and I realized the other students had their laptops with them. I asked myself how they were going to type fast enough to meet the speaking pace of the lecturer. But I realized the class was more like a conversation.”

“Literally everything has to be your own idea because they are keen about copyright so you cannot copy and share. This helps assess students and their understanding of lessons taking into consideration their opinions,” she shared.

The Vodafone boss highlighted cues for career women in the competitive corporate environment urged them to harness their negotiation skills. She believes that most women have poor negotiation skills compared to men hence, get paid lower than their actual worth. She urged career women to improve their negotiations skills having their worth in mind.

She noted, “Research says women always negotiate less strongly than men and end up in roles paying less than what they are actually worth. So as women we need to step up our negotiation skills. Know what you’re worth and what the market pays.”

Hannah Ashiokai a believer in trusting the process also advised career women against rushing their advancement. She cautioned that a rushed advancement forced by frustration mostly leads to failure.

“Don’t be frustrated and hurry the process. You have to be ready because if you’re not and you get to that level you will be exposed. And you don’t want to be there when you’ve been given the role and you cannot perform. So, take all the opportunities you can now to learn what you can so that when the opportunity is presented you are ready,” she counseled.

She shared tips for employees’ progress as she emphasized the need for employees to portray proactiveness in the working field. “You need to raise up your hand for the role. Sometimes we sit and expect people to tap us on the shoulders and say this role is available and you fit perfectly. No, you have to speak up.”

According to her, the best time for one to express interest in a role is when it’s already occupied. Hannah explained that although the role is occupied, one can meet with their HR Manager with a list of gaps identified in the role and measures to fill them. “Get your managers to view as well on what you have to do to be ready for the role before it becomes available.”

Vodafone’s HR Director further shared her experience working with Ghana’s no.1 telecommunication company as she indicated the topmost priority of the company is its staff members. According to her, they have been recognized as a top employer not just in Ghana but in Africa in the last 4 years, a feat she is proud of. She also mentioned that the youth make up the majority of the company’s staff as there are platforms to improve and train smart graduates at Vodafone.

Programs Manager for Y107.9 FM, Eddy Blay, was full of praises for Hannah Ashiokai as he urged career women to be more rigorous in their endeavors.

He said, “I’m always happy when established career women come through on the Y Leaderboard Series. Ma’am Hannah represents not just fulfilled women in society but also the very little child who is struggling to find their feet on the right path. To our parents as well, I will only encourage you to give some freedom to our children to explore. That alone comes with some level of confidence necessary for their development.”

Source: Ghana Web

Accra, April 01, GNA – Mr Chikodi Onyemerela, Acting Country Director of the British Council (Ghana and Cameroon), says the ongoing “Skills4Sucess” programme will improve media and information literacy among teachers in the country.

He said this at the first phase of the “Skills4Sucess” teacher-training programme which saw numerous lecturers and student teachers from various Colleges of Education and Universities being equipped with factual writing skills.

Speaking in an interview with the Ghana News Agency on the sidelines of the training, Mr Onyemerela said the programme aimed at providing student teachers with the knowledge and skills to develop and improve digital literacy and equipped them with factual writing skills.

This, he said, would further impact the young leaners they teach and enable them to become more familiar with online media and resources, thus, helping them to navigate misinformation and have a voice in the digital space.

Mr Onyemerela said building the digital capacity of student teachers and lecturers was very important in this modern age especially if they were to be competitive.

“We deem it important to support the development of teachers in the area of media literacy and factual writing.

“The purpose of the first phase of the training was to contextualize it so that it suits our teachers and also develop the right tools that would make the programme very successful,” he said.  

Dr Samuel Oppong Frimpong, a lecturer, University of Education, Winneba, said the training programme was beneficial because it enhanced their digital skills.

He noted that the training has exposed the need for the restructuring of education curriculum to make way for such programmes that would improve the digital literacy of students.

“I would be very delighted if such training programmes are featured in our curriculum because it would improve the creativity of learners and also their factual writing skills,” he said.

The training programme is being organised by the British Council in collaboration Wikimedia Foundation and the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission, with the second phase set to commence in August 2022.

Source: Ghana News Agency

The draw for this year’s World Cup takes place in the shadow of Doha’s skyscrapers later on Friday, with the focus on the actual football after a build-up dominated by the off-field issues surrounding the awarding of the tournament.

A star-studded draw ceremony, starting from 1600 GMT, will include former World Cup winners Cafu and Lothar Matthaeus as assistants, as holders France and their rivals discover who they will face in the group stage.

It is the most controversial World Cup in history, with Qatar dogged ever since it was named host in 2010 by accusations of vote-buying –- which were hotly denied –- and questions over the country’s suitability.

From human rights concerns to the ongoing war in Ukraine, it has been impossible to keep the spotlight solely on the sport, but Fifa president Gianni Infantino has repeated, as he did on Thursday, that it “will be a fantastic and unique World Cup”.

“We never will have another World Cup where eight stadiums are all within 50 kilometres, fans can watch several games in a day and there is no travel for teams,” he insisted ahead of the first World Cup to be played in the months of November and December.

The move away from the usual June and July slot was enforced by the summer heat in the region at that time of year.

GERMANY NOT AMONG TOP SEEDS

With the competition approaching, excitement has built around the draw.

As well as France, Pot One will be comprised of all the top seven qualified nations in the Fifa rankings as well as debutants Qatar, at 51st one of the lowest-ranked teams at the World Cup but with privileged status as hosts.

Brazil, Belgium, Lionel Messi’s Argentina, England, Spain and Cristiano Ronaldo’s Portugal are the other top seeds, with the latter benefiting from European champions Italy’s absence.

“We’ve definitely got respectability and I think we will be a team other teams wouldn’t look forward to playing,” said England manager Gareth Southgate of his side, who were semifinalists four years ago in Russia.

Germany are the biggest name in Pot Two, which also contains the Netherlands and Croatia, runners-up in 2018

African champions Senegal, Japan and Robert Lewandowski’s Poland are among the names in the third pot, and Canada will be in the fourth pot in their first appearance since 1986.

THREE PLACES STILL TO BE DECIDED

However, three qualifying spots have still to be decided in the last 32-team World Cup before it expands to 48 teams in 2026.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine led to Ukraine’s qualifying play-off semifinal against Scotland being postponed until June, with the winner of that match facing Wales for a place in Qatar.

There are also two intercontinental play-offs to come in Qatar in June, with either Australia or the United Arab Emirates facing Peru for one berth and Costa Rica playing New Zealand for the other.

Teams from the same continent will be kept apart except for those from Europe. Five groups will feature two European sides.

Qatar, a tiny Gulf state of under three million people, stunned the world when it was awarded the hosting rights.

Seven of its eight venues have been newly built, while Doha also opened a new metro system in preparation for an influx of fans from around the world. However the city remains a building site in many places.

Over 800 000 tickets have already been snapped up, and by the time the matches get underway construction should be finished on the promenade on Doha’s Corniche.

‘UNACCEPTABLE CONSEQUENCES’

Concerns remain over the treatment of gay and transgender supporters coming to a country where homosexuality is illegal, as well as over the working conditions of hundreds of thousands of migrant labourers in the country, including those who built stadiums.

At Thursday’s Fifa Congress in Doha, Lise Klaveness, head of the Norwegian Football Federation, spoke out to say that the 2018 and 2022 World Cups had been awarded “in unacceptable ways with unacceptable consequences”.

“Human rights, equality, democracy, the core interests of football were not in the starting XI until many years later,” she said.

Her comments followed an open letter from global players’ union FIFPro this week, which said: “Remember, we owe the migrant workers. It was they who toiled in scorching heat to build the infrastructure and stadiums.”

The chief executive of Qatar’s World Cup Supreme Committee, Hassan al-Thawadi, insisted the first World Cup in the Middle East would leave “truly transformational social, human, economic and environmental legacies”.

Source: Modern Ghana

MTN Nigeria Communications Pic (MTN Nigeria) has been recognized with two
awards at the recently concluded National Tax Dialogue Event organized by the
Federal Inland Revenue Service FIRS). The second edition of this stakeholder
engagement forum was held at the Banquet Hall, State House Presidential Villa Abuja on Tuesday, March 29, 2022, with his excellency, President Muhammad Buhari as the special guest of honor.

MTN Nigeria was applauded as the most tax compliant organization and a top 20
the taxpayer in Nigeria for the 2021 tax year. These awards reflect MN Nigeria’s
remarkable performance in remittance of its taxes despite the challenges posed by the pandemic.

In 2021, MTN Nigeria’s total tax contribution to all government agencies including the FIRS amounted to N757.6bn while FIRS collected a total of N6.4frn tax revenue in the year. Specifically, MTN Nigeria paid a total of N618,7bm in direct and indirect taxes to the FIRS in the 2021 tax year, representing approximately 13.5% of the total FIRS collection for the year.

“I am delighted at our performance and recognition at this year’s National Tax
Dialogue event. While the past 24 months have been challenging for our country and nations worldwide, we are committed to supporting the Federal Government’s
ongoing Economic Growth Recovery Plan (ERP),” said Modupe Kadri, Chief Financial
OFFicer (CFO), who received the awards on behalf of MTN Nigeria.

“We will continue to invest heavily in network expansion with a focus on expanding access to under-served communities. We also plan to connect an additional 2,000 rural communities in 2022,” he added.

Speaking at the event, Zainab Ahmed, Minister of Finance, Budget, and National
Planning said the dialogue was designed to engage stakeholders in the Nigerian tax space in meaningful discourse to glean information, ideas, and experience to aid policy formulation and improve the tax environment.

According to the Minister, the other tax revenue objectives are “to institutionalize a healthy tax culture among Nigerians. The right attitude towards taxation will enable every Nigerian to become a co-guardian of the tax system and the commonwealth.

Source: Ghana Web

Ghanaian music duo, Nubian Stunnaz, have released their latest tune set to cause a massive stir in the music space and in the hearts of all good music lovers.

‘Grind Harder’ by Nubian Stunnaz, is hard Drill tune. Nubian Stunnaz took turn to express their lyrical dexterity and ingenuity by advising the youth to go about their hustle and grind harder. Nubian Stunnaz used this danceable song to connect with their fans and any young person who wakes up every morning and stays on their grind.

To encourage Ghanaians to stream the song, Nubian Stunnaz said that: “As a young person, hard and smart work is what gets us successful. However, waking up every morning and getting on your grind can get a bit difficult sometimes, which is why Grind Harder should be on your playlist! Put it on rotation and get your daily boost as you hustle.”

Source: Modern Ghana

Women have been advised to practise good personal hygiene during menstrual periods to prevent infections.

 Miss Rosina Darcha, the Acting Head of the Midwifery Department at the C.K Tedam University of Technology and Applied Sciences, who gave the advice, said personal hygiene was cardinal in the health of women during this period because the menstrual blood was rich in nutrients that aided the rapid growth of infectious microorganism.

 She also advised women and adolescent girls to have their baths at least twice daily and change used sanitary pads periodically to avoid wearing one for more than six hours.

 She was speaking to selected adolescent girls from the Savelugu School of the Deaf on the role of menstrual hygiene at a menstrual hygiene forum organised by the Ghana National Association on the Deaf (GNAD) in Tamale.

 Ms Darcha said women who despised personal hygiene, especially during menstruation, were at a high risk of reproductive tract infections, which could affect their reproductive health.

She emphasised that “There is the need for women to observe and know their body well to be able to tell if there are abnormalities at a point in time to seek early medical attention.”

 She reiterated attending to infections at the initial stages to avoid complications.

 Ms Darcha encouraged parents to make their young girls understand that menstruation was a natural occurrence for women to prepare them psychologically for the stress and discomfort associated with it.

She said, “Making them understand that menstruation is natural and can be discomforting make them mentally fit to handle and easier for them to manage.”

Source: Ghana News Agency

StarTimes is pleased to announce that Mrs Akofa Banson has been appointed as General Manager of StarTimes Ghana to lead the team to achieve set targets and drive new strategies for the territory Ghana.

Mrs Akofa Banson joined StarTimes in 2016 as Head of Marketing, a position she has held until her promotion.

She is an experienced media executive with a career spanning over 20 years in Media marketing, advertising, content acquisition and film production.

Akofa was named amongst the 50 most influential CMOs in Ghana 2019 and she is an associate member of the Chartered institute of marketing Ghana.

She started her career in 1999 as a marketing officer with TV3 Network Ltd. She later became General manager for Alpha Limousine where she led sales improvements to an enormous 200% increase.

Mrs Banson joined StarTimes from African Broadcast Network, where she worked as marketing manager for five years and General manager for four years.

Her appointment takes effect from 1st April 2022, taking over from Mr Felix Ahonzo who is moving on to pursue other interests after five years with StarTimes as COO.

“We are extremely excited to have someone with her experience to lead our team on an exciting new growth path, we believe she will add significant value in achieving our vision and objectives.” the Executive Chairman, Mr. Techie said during a handing over ceremony on thursday.

StarTimes is a Pay Tv service provider with strong presence in Sub-Saharan Africa. StarTimes offers digital terrestrial television and satellite television services to its consumers.

With over 30million users in 30 African countries, StarTimes has become Africa’s leading Pay Tv service provider.

Source: Ghana Web