New US Ambassador presents Letter of Credence

The new United States Ambassador to Ghana, Mr Robert Porter Jackson, yesterday presented his Letter of Credence to President John Dramani Mahama at the Flagstaff House.

He replaces Mr Gene Cret who has completed his tour of duty of the country.

Until his new appointment, Mr Jackson served as the US Department of State’s Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for African Affairs.

Partnership

Speaking at the ceremony, President Mahama said Ghana valued its relationship with the United States, which had a long history.

He said the two countries had been working on many issues including security and agriculture.

The President stated that Ghana would be seeking collaboration with the United States to create job opportunities for young people in the agricultural sector in order to curb migration.

Security

In view of the security challenges facing West Africa, especially in maritime piracy, terrorism in the Sahel region and Boko Haram in Nigeria, the President said there was the need to build an anti-terrorism alliance to help stop terrorism, and in doing that the United States was a strong partner.

He mentioned negotiations on the security governance initiative and said they had been successful.

President Mahama said under the initiative, some priority areas including maritime security and border surveillance had been identified for action to be taken on them.

He also touched on power, and said the Millennium Challenge Programme Ghana was working on,  it had not gone as fast as expected and expressed the hope that the presence of the new envoy would speed up the process.

Envoy

Mr Jackson said he was happy to be in Ghana and pledged to work to strengthen the already strong relations between the two countries.