President Mahama Calls for UN Security Council Reform, Reset of Global Financial System at 80th UNGA
President John Dramani Mahama has urged world leaders to embark on sweeping reforms of the United Nations Security Council and overhaul the global financial architecture, which he described as “rigged against Africa.”
Addressing the 80th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York on Thursday, September 25, 2025, President Mahama stressed that Africa must be given a greater voice in the world’s multilateral financial institutions.
“While I am making requests, I would like to call for the removal of the blockade on Cuba. As Dr Kwame Nkrumah, our nation’s founder, famously said, ‘We seek to be friends of all and enemies to none.’ The Cuban people shed their blood on African soil in the fight against apartheid. Indeed, Cuba has been, and continues to be, a faithful friend to Africa,” President Mahama told the Assembly.
He highlighted the continued relevance of the UN as the “town square of the modern global village,” stressing that the body remains a unique platform for nations to address grievances and chart collective solutions.
“The Internet, social media platforms, and Artificial Intelligence offer us the illusion of connectivity, when in fact they reinforce isolation by using algorithms that ensure we do not receive new ideas and perspectives, but rather more of the same. We are served alternative facts and manipulated images, making it easier to disseminate disinformation and sow seeds of division,” he noted.
President Mahama further cautioned that the rise of nationalism, economic instability, and the erosion of multilateralism mirrored conditions that led to the failure of the League of Nations, adding that such developments posed a direct threat to global peace and security.
He also condemned the denial of visas to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and his delegation to attend the UNGA, describing it as “a bad precedent that should be deeply worrying to all member nations.”
“Ghana recognised the state of Palestine in 1988 and supported a two-state solution to the conflict,” he reaffirmed.
