Ghana's president President Nana Akufo-Addo said aid to his nation from donor countries was unsustainable and harmful to both sides.
"We do not want to remain the beggars of the world, we do not want to be dependent on charity," he said in a speech in London, setting out a vision for Africa's future. "We can and we should be able to build a Ghana with use of her own resources and their proper management as a way to engineer social and economic growth in our country," he said. "We do not want to be pitied," he said. "We do not want to be pawns or victims."
Resource-rich Ghana is an exporter of gold and oil and the world's second largest cocoa producer. Akufo-Addo has vowed to clean up corruption in the West African nation's cocoa sector and restore output to 1 million tonnes by 2020.
Ghana was the first country in sub-Saharan Africa to win independence from colonial rule 60 years ago. "We are painfully aware we are nowhere near where we should be," he said in the speech to the Royal African Society. "After 60 years it is obvious that the aid bus will not take Africa where it has to be."
"We have to stop the aid, it messes up our economy, it messes up our markets," added Herman Chinery-Hesse, a Ghanaian software entrepreneur.
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