President Mahama Launches “A Sovereign Future for Health” Report
President John Dramani Mahama has launched “A Sovereign Future for Health,” a report by the High-Level Panel on Reform of the Global Health Architecture and Governance, which sets out ten practical recommendations.
The report was unveiled at a High-Level Side Event on the Accra Reset: Global Reset Dialogue, held on the sidelines of the 81st United Nations General Assembly.
The recommendations address reforms needed to strengthen health systems in the Global South and reduce dependence on external funding.
President Mahama launched the report on Monday at the Marriott Marquis in New York.
The High-Level Panel was constituted as part of the Accra Reset initiative, which was launched one year ago. The Panel is co-chaired by Peter Piot, Elhadj As Sy, Priscila Ferraz Soares and Budi Gunadi Sadikin, with Michel Sidibé as Special Advisor.
In his remarks, President Mahama said the Panel was asked in Dakar in July to be bold, avoid vague diplomatic generalities, choose its controversies wisely and write for the Global South citizen on the street. He said the Panel has delivered on that mandate.
“Today, the Panel has delivered. I offer my deepest appreciation to our Co-Chairs and every member of the Panel for fulfilling this mandate,” he said.
The President said the report begins with an undeniable historical truth, recalling that in 1955 twenty-nine nations gathered in Bandung to demand a seat at the world’s table. He said that although political independence was won, the levers of global trade, finance and health governance remained firmly anchored elsewhere.
He noted that in 2005, the world met in Paris and crowned “country ownership” as the guiding principle of development cooperation. He described the phrase as pleasant but said the Global South was handed a broken cauldron and asked to own a soup cooked entirely in someone else’s kitchen.
“For decades, nations of the Global South have been asked to own the results of health and development programmes, while others retain the control,” he said.
President Mahama said the Accra Reset declares that there can be no ownership without control, adding that sovereignty does not magically appear because a country signed a donor agreement. He also said there can be no control without accountability to the people.
He said the New Global Bargain rests on responsibility matched by authority, authority backed by real productive capability, and every partner held accountable for their promises.
The President said health was selected as the first battleground for the global reset because it is any human’s most precious possession, with maternal and child health as the first test. He noted that nearly seven out of ten maternal deaths occur in Sub-Saharan Africa, and that Ghana remains three times above the recommended SDG target.
He said the Mother Africa initiative, championed by President Samia Suluhu Hassan of Tanzania, and the Business United for Mothers, Babies and Youth campaign are bringing public policy and corporate responsibility together to safeguard the lives of mothers and children.
President Mahama said Ghana and the Presidential Council will convene governments, global health bodies, development finance institutions, philanthropies and the private sector to translate the recommendations into country-level compacts. He invited strategic partners, from Brazil’s Fiocruz to leading institutions in India, Indonesia, the Gulf and across Africa, to build self-sustaining networks that connect research, regulatory oversight, local manufacturing and reliable distribution.
He expressed appreciation to Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organisation, for his support of global health reform, and thanked Prime Minister Gordon Brown for accepting the responsibility of mobilising global political leadership around the New Global Bargain.
The President said the sovereign health agenda is not a retreat into isolationism, but a search for pragmatic interdependence and a mature, equal partnership. He noted that stronger, self-reliant partners in the South are not a threat to the Global North, and that resilient health systems in Africa and Asia make the entire world safer.
He announced that Ghana will carry the Reset agenda into the heart of Africa’s collective policy framework when it assumes the Chairmanship of the African Union in 2027, working with the Non-Aligned Movement and the G77 plus China.
“We have come full circle; let us not go around in circles,” he said. “Let this New Global Bargain begin today: ownership backed by real control; cooperation defined by human dignity; and promises that manifest as real protection for that baby girl born tonight, whether in Kathmandu, in Arusha, or in Damongo.”
Richard Aniagyei, ISD
