By Ishmael Junourgh 
Minister of Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts, Dzifa Abla Gomashie, has used this year’s Fugu Wednesday celebration to engage key players in Ghana’s tourism, culture and creative arts sector, including Princess Umul Hatiyya, founder of the PUH Foundation, and participants of the African Monologue Challenge.
The Minister welcomed Princess Umul Hatiyya to the Ministry for what she described as a long-overdue meeting, during which the Princess briefed her on the foundation’s “Journey in the Pragyia,” also known as the Tuktuk Journey.
The initiative seeks to encourage participants to experience Ghana by travelling across the country to “see Ghana, feel Ghana, eat Ghana and breathe Ghana,” highlighting the country’s diverse tourism, cultural and culinary experiences.
The Minister also met young participants of the African Monologue Challenge, an initiative bringing young Africans from 25 countries together in the Pan-African House.
The participants shared their experiences of the programme with the Minister, highlighting opportunities for cultural exchange, learning and collaboration among young people from different parts of the continent.
The African Monologue Challenge is designed to promote inter-African trade, tourism and cultural exchange. Its 12 finalists were selected from more than 2,000 entries from across Africa.
For Minister Gomashie, the gathering represents the kind of continental interaction envisioned by Africa’s founding leaders, as young Africans build relationships and deepen their understanding of one another beyond national borders.
She reflected that Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, Julius Nyerere, Kenneth Kaunda and other pioneers of African unity would be proud to see their grandchildren gathered under one roof, learning from one another and exploring opportunities to work together.
The engagements formed part of the Minister’s activities marking Fugu Wednesday, a cultural initiative that uses Ghana’s distinctive traditional textile and fashion heritage to promote cultural identity, creativity and tourism. The engagements also underscored the growing intersection between culture, tourism, youth participation and African integration in advancing Ghana’s creative economy and strengthening people-to-people connections across the continent.