Your Excellency the Vice President of the State of Ghana, Honorable Ministers of State, Honorable MPs and DCEs, The Clergy, Togbewo, Mamawo, The Media, Distinguished invited Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen, Dear Friends.

This Sasadu Festival is a very special one for me. It is the year of my tenth anniversary as a queen mother in Sasadu Traditional Areas. It is ten years now, that I have sworn the Great Oath. Of course at the very beginning I haven’t been really aware, that my life would change completely. But it did. Nothing has been like before. There was not even one day, that I didn’t think of my people here, knowing that the commitment to my position, my wish to help the people to get out of poverty, the desire to develop the areas and to be able to conciliate our Alavanyo-Nkonya conflict and certain chieftaincy issues will never be enough to solve all problems.
These ten years have been a big challenge to me, a European, who at first didn’t know much about Ghana and her people’s culture. Nevertheless I have been very lucky to have found good teachers and very kind people who have helped me in building the necessary cultural bridges. Ghana and especially SASA areas have been a gift to me. A gift we are certainly not able to pay for. I call it destiny. I had the big advantage of being coronated in areas where I found like -minded people, interested in development and ready to work hard for it.
I tried my best to bring development to my areas. But development by itself can’t just be brought. Development has to be implemented in the minds and the mentality of the people. Development has to start in the head mind of the individuals. It is a matter of responsibility to us, our children and our country. We can’t always wait for the Government, no matter which party is in power, to solve all our problems. We can’t wait, and that is even worth, always for foreigners to be taking care of us. The Government needs the support of the people, the impact of their ideas, their willingness to learn. Education is the keyword of development. Education will bring us out of poverty and it is a matter of fact that education has to be provided by the Government in power. It is sad; that we are still having so many schools under trees in the country and that the books are not provided for free.
But what are we waiting for? Germany has not been built in fifty years, it was a long process, which took us more than one thousand years, can you imagine? How can we be so arrogant to think that Ghana will have the same standard like European countries in just a couple of years? Having technology and mobile phones doesn’t mean that we are having significant development proceedings within a comparatively short period. We all know that it will take some time, much more time, to develop a third world country. But we are not patient. Development can’t reach all of us in the same manner and time, even if we would like to have it, as soon, as better.
It is also a matter of fact, that power in third world countries is playing a big role, maybe because of the opportunities to take personal advantage of it. I don’t want to talk about politics. I want to talk about the role of our traditional leaders. They are sometimes fighting for titles and power and I’ve got the impression, that these fights are having an adverse impact on the development of their areas. Just sitting in state doesn’t help our people. If we use our power with a little less selfishness, then we could achieve a lot. I am happy, that I am the Ngoyifiaga of Sasadu, a development union, which has been formed more than fifty years ago. I agreed on taking the title, because I saw the potential of the vision behind. The SASA Development Union has been founded in 1947; can you imagine how progressive the founders have already been at that time? Uniting the people, to enable them to benefit from their collective responsibilities – this is still very modern and has outlived many decades already.  I am proud and I feel much honored to be part of a development union which has had modern leaders over a long time. Since I came into this union, I have realized that it is still the same, ideas and visions have not changed until now, something which is a phenomenon for most African countries where ideas are very often picked up quickly but not continued over the years. In SASADU this means commitment, hard work, creativity, modern leadership, visions and of course the logical consequence of it; patience, open mindedness and diplomacy.
But sadly I had to realize, that even in my areas chieftaincy problems came up and blocked the development in certain parts of it. Unity makes strong, unity gives us the wings we need to get out of poverty. What can I achieve without being backed by all of you? Thank you for all the support that you have given to me. I also want to thank the past and the present Government for their support of my development work in Ghana. I hope that support will continue and we can do much more together to develop the Volta Region.
I have done nearly 100 projects in Ghana in the last ten years, bigger and smaller ones and not all of them have been done in Volta Region. But certainly I am focused on my areas. Akrofu has not yet got a project. Today we are launching one. Akrofu will get 1.000 school uniforms for their pupils. I could encourage one of my donors, Mr. Steinbicker from Malta, to donate them to this particular area. They will be sewed soon. The sewing project of Mama Atrato in Ho will be in charge of it. I want to thank her in absence for her support for this project.
Some of you asked me, why I didn’t celebrate my tenth anniversary yet. To be honest with you, I thought it is not the time to do it. How can I spend money to celebrate myself and my people don’t get anything out of it? So I decided to do a further project. I have the four SASADU colors here with me. And I would like to ask Edith, the wife of Hon. Joseph Amewode, to do the Lottery for us. The Lottery will show us, which area is getting the next project. And it will be done in a village, which hasn’t got a project yet. The value will be twenty thousand new cedies, 200 million old cedies.
I want to end my speech with a Ghanaian proverb, which says: Nuse le deka worworme! Unity is strength, division is weakness.
We are from SASA Areas – but we are Ghanaians too. Long live SASA, long live Ghana!
Akpe!
SASA!!!
Mamaga Akosua I