The rationale for the campaign, Mr Amankwah explained, was to rally all Ghanaians to play a role in nation building.

“Before we can work together, we first need to commit to something that we all believe in. The pledge campaign encourages all Ghanaians to be supportive of the government and the country,” he explained when he addressed a news conference at the Flagstaff House in Accra yesterday.

He also unveiled a detailed programme of activities for the first phase of the year-long celebration, which started from February 9, 2017 with an evening with the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, during which he hosted Corporate Ghana and also unveiled the logo for the anniversary.

The first phase is expected to end on March 12, 2017 with a festival by the Musicians Union of Ghana (MUSIGA).

Key activities

Throwing light on some key activities for the period, Lord Commey, the Chairman of the Sub-committee on Events, said there would be the launch of a Jubilee Technology Start-up Challenge for the many talented young Ghanaians whose innovations never saw the light of day because of lack of funding.

He said the competition would unveil innovations that boosted governance, business, health, education and other areas.

“This will be a competition to unearth talented innovators whose innovations will accelerate some strand of Ghana’s development,” he said.

Tales from yesteryears, a documentary featuring older people recounting their experiences and memories of the pre-independence struggle, independence and the post-independence era, would also be running on television.

Entrepreneur challenge

Lord Commey said a Jubilee Youth Entrepreneur Challenge would also be launched, predicated on the difficulty young people faced in raising capital and which prevented them from fully realising their potential.

The challenge would solicit business ideas from young people across the country and reward the most-likely-to-be- profitable ideas, he said.

There would also be a lecture on the theme: “Mobilising for Ghana’s future”, to herald a series of nationwide lectures outlined for the year-long programme.

Appeal to businesses

Lord Commey announced that there would be a national flag-draping campaign and appealed to businesses, as part of their corporate responsibility, to adopt the major roads near their offices and decorate them with flags, buntings, balloons and lights.

There would be a night of choral music, the highlight of which would be the launch by the National Symphony Orchestra of a rendition of the National Anthem using only local instruments, he added.

He said the Ghana Museums and Monuments Board (GMMB) would mount a photo exhibition depicting the colonial times, in view of which the board would transform parts of the Christianborg Castle, the former seat of government at Osu, into a museum space.

Legacy Project

Lord Commey said Ghana had had nine Presidents since independence but not much was displayed anywhere about them, except the country’s first President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah.

As part of the celebration, he said, there would be the inauguration of a Presidential Museum which would be a legacy project to celebrate the country’s former leaders and also the 60th anniversary of the GMMB, which falls on February 5.

There would also be the ‘Know Your Ghana’ campaign, a domestic tourism campaign spearheaded by the Presidency, which would be launched at the photo exhibition, he added.

He explained that when the perpetual flame was lit on Independence Day, a torch would also be lit using the flame.

Relay torch for all regions

“This torch will embark on a relay throughout the whole of Ghana, region by region, and return to its starting point on March 6, 2018. Chiefs, opinion leaders, local celebrities and Ghanaians from all walks of life will be part of this relay,” he said.

He said the President would, within the period, cut the sod for the Presidential Legacy Project, while there would be the Masqueraders’ Festival and the National Festival on Culture where each region would be given an opportunity to showcase a part of its culture that was unique.

The Chairman of the Media Sub-committee, Mr Jefferson Sackey, throwing more light on the ‘I Pledge’ Campaign, said it would create awareness of the many things that Ghanaians could do differently to help raise the flag of the country higher.

The campaign, he said, aimed at spreading a broad change in attitude or mindset in all parts of the country with the view to getting the citizenry to pledge their support to help build a desirable nation.

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Source: Graphic.com.gh

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It said the logo, inspired by two adinkra symbols, ‘Mati Masie’ and ‘Tikoro nko agyina’, was designed by one Emmanuel Addo, a student at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST).

[contextly_sidebar id=”Liqs3GBnci6uCUNqi2c2yK3PjBYcWidt”]At a press conference at the Flagstaff House in Accra, Mr Jefferson Sackey, Chairman of the Media Sub-Committee of the Anniversary Planning Committee, said the committee went through a deliberate and thorough process to arrive at the logo that was launched by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo last Thursday.

He said the committee invited and had over 50 proposals from artists and designers, out of which 20 designs were shortlisted.

He said the committee, with the help of some experts, further scaled down the designs to five before settling on the logo, which was unveiled last week, adding that the selection process would not lend itself to a plagiarized work.

Over the weekend, social media was abuzz with news that the logo for the year-long 60th anniversary celebration that starts on from the month of March had been copied from an Indian youth association emblem.

Various radio stations also took to discussing the issue, with discussants querying the Commission.

Mr Sackey told the media that that accusation was unfounded because “The issue of plagiarism is something that comes to us as a surprise.”

“The issue of plagiarism is something that comes to us as a surprise. It was a transparent process. People submitted their artworks, we ensure that we saw the process with which they were going through in designing their logos. At the national planning committee, they went ahead, selected 5 of the logos and we actually had to submitted these 5 logos to experts in the design and media industries to see if they can link the theme to what they have actually presented, and in doing that, we were able to get it,” Jefferson Sackey said.

He said the Committee’s investigation had revealed that certain interest hurriedly put together a website over the weekend with the same logo, ostensibly to “paint us in a bad light,” to upset the plans of the Committee.

He said that after intensive deliberations and scrutiny of the designs presented by the various designers, the Committee shortlisted five out of the 20 entries, and subsequently Mr Addo’s designed was eventually selected after consultations with experts in the creative arts industry.

The design, Mr Sackey said, captured the essence of the theme for the celebration. It comprises two Adinkra symbols and people holding hands with heads together in a circle, symbolising togetherness, duality of the essence of life, diversity in democracy and inter-dependency.

He said the elements in the design complemented the theme for the anniversary: ‘‘Ghana, 60 years on, mobilising for Ghana’s Future’’.

Mr Sackey presented the Committee’s nationalism project dubbed “The Pledge Campaign,’’ aimed at rejuvenating the Ghanaian spirit of patriotism, ingenuity and self-belief for sustained national development.

The campaign is intended to change the attitudes and mindset of Ghanaians geared towards building a desirable nation for accelerated national development.

In view of this, he encouraged Ghanaians to share short videos or pictures through the social or print media on how to support the campaign.

This, he said, could be demonstrated through social activities such as volunteering to donate blood, paying taxes to the authorities and keeping the environment clean, as well as eschewing bribes and corruption in society.

He, therefore, urged all Ghanaians to show interest and support the campaign in order to achieve a national ideological agenda.

Meanwhile, the Committee had urged corporate entities and philanthropic organisations to come to the aid of the Committee with financial and logistical support.

Mr Ken Amankwah, Chairman of the Committee indicated that the GH¢20 million budgeted for the celebration would not come from the national coffers, but would be sourced from donations by corporate entities and the general public.

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Source: GNA

The post Ghana@60 anniversary logo explained; inspired by Adinkra appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

According to him, the logo was designed “from scratch” by a local designer.

Speaking on Eyewitness News on Friday, [February 11, 2017], he told host, Richard Sky that the logo was chosen out of several other samples that were presented.

[contextly_sidebar id=”nMumdLjdVeUE9D6AYICQEZ049I0AlhRo”]“This logo was put together from scratch. It is very original. There was back and forth as to how it should look. It is an original artwork. The two symbols we are talking about have absolutely distinguishing features. I think we have a logo which is original and I am clear in my mind about that. There were other logos that came forward, and they were compared with logos elsewhere and some of us came to the conclusion that those do not pass and this particular one has passed.”

Many Ghanaians took to social media on Friday to criticize the government for a seemingly poor job on the logo after it emerged that some parts of the anniversary logo was ‘lifted’ from the existing logo of an organization abroad.

But according to Mr. Jinapor, it is wrong to say the Ghana@60 logo was only copied and not originally designed.

Meanwhile, the Deputy Chief of Staff has explained that Nana Akufo-Addo’s announcement of a GHs20 million budget for the Ghana@60 celebration is not outrageous.

According to him, the budget includes monies to be used to undertake legacy projects that will be beneficial to Ghanaians.

“The assumption that we are going to spend GH¢20 million on parties or eating and drinking is not true. That is not what the money will be entirely used for. I am a member of the legacy projects sub-committee, and we received a proposal from a young man who says that we should find a way to fund the psychiatric hospital as a legacy project for the 60th anniversary. It is a proposal that we are discussing and in the end, we will have projects which will be out-doored and executed to commemorate the 60th-anniversary celebration,” Mr. Jinapor explained.

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By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post Ghana@60 logo not copied, its ‘very original’ – Abu Jinapor appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.