President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has pledged the government’s commitment to improve the cinema industry to be able to produce world-class films.
He said Cabinet was developing a favourable fiscal tax system for cinema projects, including income tax and VAT incentives, import duty exemptions on film production equipment, a 20 per cent tax rebate for strategic film productions, and film finance concessions.
This will be out-doored very soon and should provide another tangible reason for the choice of Ghana as a film production country,” he said.
Delivering the State of the Nations Address on Tuesday in Parliament, the President said Ghana was finally meeting its long-promised potential in the tourism sector.
“Starting from the events and excitement of the Year of Return in 2019, Ghana has truly become an attractive tourist destination, with visitor numbers increasing every year.”
He said the “December in GH” was now a well-established and increasingly appealing phenomenon that attracts visitors to the country in December and has altered the events schedule in Accra and many other locations over the Christmas season.
The President noted that, for the first time since the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park was built in 1992, the government had completed a full modernisation and rehabilitation of the facility, and that the number of domestic and international visitors had increased dramatically since the park’s commission in July 2023.
“Since the commissioning, there have been 208,557 domestic and international visitors to the Park between July 14 and December 31, 2023.”
He added that other facilities were being upgraded, and it was encouraging to see that the business sector was interested in developing tourist attractions.
“The National Museum Gallery, which had been closed since 2015, has also been fully refurbished. It attracted over 35,000 visitors in 2023, and I am particularly pleased that school children form a good part of the visitors to these sites.”
President Akufo-Addo said that the first Kente Museum, which aims to preserve Ghana’s cultural heritage, has been built in Bonwire, Ashanti Region, and was recently commissioned by the Second Lady.
He announced that preparatory work and designs for the Heroes Park, a museum honouring Ghana’s founding fathers, the Big Six, JB Danquah, Emmanuel Obetsebi-Lamptey, Edward Akufo-Addo, Ebenezer Ako Adjei, William Ofori-Atta, and Kwame Nkrumah, were completed in December 2023, and construction would begin shortly.
GNA
KAS
27 Feb. 2023
