The Church and the State have been urged to make initiatives that favour the poor, the core of their policies to improve the lives of people in the country.
�If this is done, it would ensure that no one is left behind in poverty reduction strategies and it will lead to proper management of resources,� Dr. Esther Offei-Aboagye, Director of the Institute of Local Government Studies, has said.
She was speaking at a symposium in Accra, to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Christian Council of Ghana. She said �the church and the state have done well, but a change in policies towards the poor in society will improve their lives tremendously�.
Speaking on the topic; �Material Poverty and Solutions,� Dr Offei-Aboagye said, the State and the Church should constantly examine their programmes and strategically plan to improve existing structures of the poor.
To achieve this feat, she said, information on pro-poor initiatives should be publicized to enable the targeted beneficiaries to access them. Dr. Offei-Aboagye said that most poverty alleviation programmes had failed to achieve their objectives because they had been targeted at the wrong persons and communities.
�If you say that you are giving micro-credit to the poor and they do not hear about it, how will they benefit?� she asked, adding that it was time due diligence and proper coordination was done at the institutional and community levels to ensure that the right things were done. She said �weak institutions, lack of coordination and malfunction of structures at the local and national levels had contributed seriously to the high rate of unemployment and poverty in the country.
Hence, she advised that people should plan their lives well in order not to suffer or face financial difficulties during old age.
A member of the Christian Council, the Reverend Prof. J.S. Pobee, called for unity among religious bodies and Ghanaians to ensure social and economic well being for all. �God�s creation is one, and no one has exclusivity; hence with a united vision the church and the state can succeed,� he said.
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