Here’s why Akufo-Addo nearly wept while driving

• Kwasi Amoako-Attah addressed the press on Sunday, May 23, 2021, on the subject “Improving Ghana’s Road Network”

• He explained a rare occasion where the president shared his emotions with him, stating that the president was close to tears

• The minister stated that the president explained that this is why he prefers to travel by road in the country

These are not stories you hear every day but the Roads and Highways Minister, Kwasi Amoako-Attah, has narrated how, one time, the president came close to tears after driving on a very bad road.

According to the minister, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, together with him, travelled on the Hamile road and by the time they arrived at their destination for the event they had gone for, the president had a brief, yet emotional conversation with him.

He explained that the president immediately tasked him to fix the road so as to give the people along that stretch better lives.

Read his accounts as transcribed by GhanaWeb‘s Etsey Atisu, during this week’s Minister’s Press Briefing on the subject, “Improving Ghana’s Road Network.”

“Nobody has ever said; nobody from government has ever stood anywhere and said that all roads have been done in our country. No! Nobody can say that. And neither has anybody said that we don’t have roads in our country. We have bad roads in our country.

“I traveled with His Excellency on the road to Hamile; a terrible road. And when we got to Hamile, on the platform – on the stage, I was privileged to sit next to him and Ghanaians are listening to me, and I’ve already said that I, Kwesi Amoako-Attah, drops anything from my lips that is not true…

“On the platform, after driving on the Hamile road; terrible road, when we sat down, president beckoned to me, and said to me, Minister, did you see the road we traveled on? The towns and the conditions of the people? I said, “Yes, Mr. President.” He said, When I sat in my car, I felt like weeping.

“He said he felt like weeping when we were driving on that road. This is the president of the Republic. And he said, that is why anywhere we go, I don’t want to go with a helicopter; I want to experience and I want to drive on the roads. I am directing you to work on that road.”