[dropcap]G[/dropcap]hanaian Super Model Anita Ofori is launching a new campaign ‘Attitudinal Change’ to help sensitize and hopefully correct some attitudes inculcated in Ghanaians that is not helping us progress but rather retrogress as a nation.
Anita Ofori, a product of the University of Ghana, Legon, is a runway and photo model who has featured in many big fashion events in Africa, Asia and Europe. She has also featured in some international commercials.
She represented Ghana in the Miss Model of the World pageant held in china- Asia, where she raised the flag of Ghana.
She also represented Ghana at the UN (United Nations) – Geneva in an international women’s day conference.
[ads1]Talking about her new project ‘Attitudinal Change’, Anita Ofori told FN News in an exclusive interview, that the campaign is very necessary because there are some behaviours and attitudes Ghanaians must do away with in order to achieve the better Ghana we are all crying and praying for.
She mentioned lackadaisical attitudes, low commitment towards work, laziness, absenteeism, bribery and corruption to be the common attitudes among the Ghanaian workers which ought to be addressed. She also said that these problems exist in the various sectors of the economy from the government to the common lay man. Authorities giving permit to people to build at inappropriate locations, fuel stations situated in crowded areas among others.
According to her, although there has been a lot of talk on the subject by prominent persons even from the incumbent Ghanaian President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo- Addo, no results have been recorded as of yet, rather the ominous and frequent call on government to change Ghana seems to be the order of the day and this runs through every sector and almost every problem. If there is filth in a particular area, we call on the government, choked gutters we call on the government, every problem the average Ghanaian will call on the government to address. She believes the average Ghanaian shares a dual responsibility with the government in ensuring Ghana develops and becomes a better country.
Anita ofori feels that there should be strict enforcement of law in the country to help stop this problem. Ghanians must be made to trust in our legal system.
It has become a heavy burden on Anita Ofori’s heart to see changes in Ghanaians so as to move the economy forward for everyone’s betterment. Patriotism is what we need for a better Ghana.
As part of the campaign, Anita Ofori and her team will storm school campus to educate and enlighten students in the junior high, senior high schools and at the tertiary levels. They will also work relentlessly, using all forms of media to see some level of change among Ghanians.
Read her full statement below;
“I am very sensitive about social problems. Every problem in our society gets to me personally and I become very emotional about it.
Talk of gender issues, discrimination, legal issues etc.
I am always thinking around what can be done to make things better.
Having had the opportunity to travel outside Ghana, I find the inconsistencies in our system saddening and I feel as a country we can do better.
I listen to the news and I get so sensitive about every single negative issue and wonder why things are the way they are.
I have been nursing this idea for attitudinal change project for so long ; that was my intended project whilst in my second year during the campus based pageant which I emerged the first runner up. Coming up as first runner up saw me helping the queen with her project and unfortunately later when I could pursue my own project I let the trail grow coId and pursued other projects. Seeing what is going on in the country for some years now, I feel it is about time I embark on it and this is definitely the right time to embark on this project; Ghana needs it now more than ever.
Years on, I have been passionate about other singled out social problems which I have written about and working on it to reach out for help soon after this project has picked up and made the expected impact.
During last year’s general elections, I realised that Ghanaians were hungry for change. But my issue was that even if there is a change in government and people’s attitudes still remain the same, there will be zero development.
I am particularly sensitive about this because it seems the Ghanaian culture that we read about & saw growing up where certain individuals fought for their tribes, women and children agendas and mother Ghana like Mrs Konadu Rawlings , Joyce Aryee, Yaa Asantewa, Osaagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah has become extinct. What we see & hear now, are Ghanaians exploiting & causing so much financial loss to mother Ghana; I mean every single Ghanaian not only the high ranking members in society but from the simple market woman selling tomatoes at an outrageous/exorbitant price, the ‘trotro’ mate charging his own fares, people disregarding laws & putting filling stations & businesses at places they aren’t supposed to ( the worrying question is who, how & why do they get the permit at these unauthorized places). The Ghanaian acting as a front for a foreign national to register businesses not supposed to be engaged by foreign nationals among others.
Now, the Ghanaian culture is one that do not build but destroy (we need attitudinal change). It doesn’t matter whether mother Ghana suffers so long as an individual Ghanaian benefits; that is the Ghanaian culture now.
I have deliberated for long and nothing is changing, for every social reform it takes just an individual to set it in motion. I have decided to be that bold young woman just like Yaa Asantewa, and take that urgent step, calling on every single Ghanaian male and female, old and young, my call especially goes to the youth, let us rise and fight for mother Ghana, mother Ghana is in agony.
I have hope revisiting this change project will yield the required and better results as already there is a strong team of young Ghanaians who have already joined the ‘Attitudinal Change Movement’ and working with me …. I say ‘Together We Can’
As part of sensitizing, getting and encouraging as many Ghanaians as possible if not all on the need to change their attitudes positively in whatever sector they find themselves in for mother Ghana to develop I have decided to relentlessly pursue the change project and write about it.
I have pledged on my honour to see this project to the end because if I didn’t do anything about it, the problem will still remain since I realised we had to tackle the problem from its root.
So I started taking about it to friends and family and this is where we are now.”
Source: www.fnnewsonline.com
