.The official name of the seat of government has been reversed from Flagstaff House to Jubilee House by the current NPP Government.
It was initially given the name Flagstaff House by Ghana’s first President Dr. Kwame Nkrumah. This was after he re-developed it in the 1960s to serve as his official residence and office.
The facility was re-built in 2008 during the tenure of the New Patriotic Party’s (NPP) John Agyekum Kufuor.
In 2009, the Indian government took over the finance and construction of the edifice which serves as seat for the president with an amount of $135.
After its construction, it was named the Golden Jubilee House when Ghana was celebrating 50 years since independence.
However, the name didn’t go down well with the then Opposition Party, the Democratic Congress (NDC) under the late President John Evans Atta-Mills.
And so when he took over governance in 2009, Prof. Mills moved the office of the president back to the Osu Castle. He later changed the sign in front of the building back to its original name(Flagstaff House). This according to him was because the previous government had not used a Legislative Instrument to effect the change as required by law.
As usual, the NPP couldn’t also accept this change. It vowed to change the name back to Jubilee House whenever it regained power.
Background
The name of the building has been a bone of contention between the NPP and National Democratic Congress (NDC) over the past decade. This is however, depending on which party is in government.
Meanwhile, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo in his campaign hinted of the name change.
According to him, the position of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to rename the Flagstaff House and Founder’s Day is outstanding.
Akufo-Addo gets $1m India money to renovate Jubilee House
The Indian government donated an amount of$1 million dollars to the Akufo-Addo government. That was in August 2017 for the renovation of the edifice.
Making the donation was India’s Minister of State for External Affairs, M.J. Akbar who paid a courtesy call on President Nana Akufo-Addo on the occasion of India’s 70th independence anniversary.
The change of name of the seat of government become the second time in nine years.