RICHNESS the WRITER

By Richard Agodzo As World AIDS Day approaches, the annual themes that once rallied governments, communities and funders now read like a timeline of hope we risk losing. From “Getting to Zero” years to 2024’s human-rights call to “Take the Rights Path,” global messaging has been clear: end AIDS through justice, community leadership and sustained services. Yet between those slogans and life on the ground in Ghana, there is an increasingly dangerous gap — one made wider by funding cuts, interrupted supply chains and deepening stigma, including a new, corrosive online stigma facing young people living with HIV. - UNAIDS What the recent themes ask of us — and why Ghana’s record matters World AIDS Day themes urge countries to prioritise rights, communities, and resilience. In 2024, the global call was explicit: 'Take The Rights Path' — put human rights at the centre of prevention, treatment and stigma elimination. In 2025, the global message turned to resilience: “Overcoming disrupt...

By Richard Agodzo I still remember that Tuesday afternoon vividly. The sun was fierce, and I had just stopped by a kiosk to send some money. There he was — Desmond — the young man who once came to me years ago, asking if I had old textbooks he could use for school. I had watched him grow from a quiet primary school boy into a determined senior high graduate. Now, he was running his own small mobile money business, his smile as warm as ever. We exchanged greetings, and I promised to check in another time. Two days later, the news hit me like thunder — Desmond had been shot and killed by armed robbers on his way home from work. His crime? Simply trying to earn an honest living, facilitating the cashless dreams of a digital Ghana. Desmond’s death is not an isolated tragedy . It is a reflection of the darker side of Ghana’s rapidly expanding mobile money ecosystem — one plagued by fraud, identity theft, insider data leaks, and security loopholes that have turned convenience into vulnerabil...