[ 2017-02-03 ]

Flagstaff House is now changed to Jubilee House by the new government

Flagstaff House now Jubilee House
The name ‘Flagstaff House,’ Ghana’s seat of
government, appears to have been changed to
‘Jubilee House’ by the Akufo-Addo-led New
Patriotic Party (NPP) government.

Recent correspondences personally signed by
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo indicated
‘Jubilee House’ instead of ‘Flagstaff
House.’

There has always been a tussle between the current
NPP administration and the former National
Democratic Congress (NDC) government over what
name should actually be used for the seat of
government.

Initially called Flagstaff House when Ghana’s
first President Kwame Nkrumah re-developed the
facility in the 1960s to serve as his official
residence and office, the NPP government under
President John Agyekum Kufuor, rebuilt the whole
place into a top-class edifice and changed the
name to (Golden) Jubilee House as a monument in
commemoration of Ghana’s 50th independence
anniversary.

Before being used by Ghana’s first president,
the facility had been used as the residence of the
Inspector General of the Gold Coast Constabulary
in the colonial days.

However, immediately after the NDC won power in
2009, it reverted to ‘Flagstaff House,’
sparking a heated political debate at the time,
especially when John Mahama moved his office to
the place from the Osu Castle where his
predecessors, the late President John Evans Atta
Mills, Presidents John Agyekum Kufuor and Jerry
John Rawlings had governed the country from.

Some other names put on important edifices were
equally changed.

For instance, the immediate past Accra
Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) Chief Executive Alfred
Okoe Vanderpuije – now MP for Ablekuma South –
led an operation to change the name Ohene Djan
Sports Stadium to Accra Sports Stadium, as well as
the names of other state facilities in Accra.

The NDC top figures, then in opposition, condemned
President Kufuor and his NPP government for what
they claimed to be profligate construction of the
‘Jubilee House,’ which was funded by the
Indian government with a very low interest on the
loan.

Some NDC officials were even on record as saying
that they were going to use the facility for
poultry – a comment that attracted condemnation
from sections of the public.

President Mills did not use the Jubilee House and
remained at the Osu Castle; but when President
John Mahama took over after the sudden demise of
the law professor, he (Mahama) moved into the
edifice immediately he controversially won the
2012 election.

The Mahama government started with correspondences
on ‘Jubilee Flagstaff House’ letterheads,
indicating that it was merging the names.

However, when NDC General Secretary, Johnson
Asiedu Nketia, was asked about the development, he
said cabinet had not taken any decision to merge
the two names.

Mahama Ayariga, then Minister of Information, had
to take responsibility for the gaffe and the name
was soon reverted to ‘Flagstaff House.’

Throughout the campaign, then NPP candidate Nana
Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo never referred to the seat
of government as ‘Flagstaff House.’

During the 2016 electioneering campaign, he said
“Everybody should come and ride on the back of
the ‘Elephant’” (the NPP, as it uses the
elephant as its symbol). “The ‘Elephant’ has
entered the White House; let us get the
‘Elephant’ in the Jubilee House.”

Source - dailyguideafrica.com

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