AngloGold Ashanti has pledged to increase investments in education and other sectors of the economy, to improve the livelihoods of people in its catchment. Senior Vice President, Peter Anderton says the company has leveraged on its core mining business over the past fifty years to be a key contributor to Ghana’s educational development and employment creation. According to him, the company has helped train more than four thousand indigenes in skills acquisition under its educational program. Mr. Anderton was speaking at the 50th anniversary celebration of the AngloGold Ashanti Basic School at Obuasi. The AngloGold Basic School, initially set up for children of expatriates in 1961, is now opened to children and dependants of Ghanaian employees. It currently has a student population of over 1,500 pupils with 60 teachers. The school’s quality academic performance has propelled the Obuasi Municipality to top the list of best performers in the Basic Educational Certificate Examination (BECE) over the last ten years. According to Mr. Anderton, the contribution by AngloGold Ashanti is aligned to its core values of making people in the company’s catchment better off and improving human capacity. “The Obuasi and Iduaprim mines further have community apprenticeship schemes, where practical training in engineering is provided to graduates from the country’s technical, vocational and tertiary institutions”. He announced the release of 2 million US Dollars to the National Sports Council for the construction of multi-purpose sports centers in all ten regions of Ghana. “The idea is to promote sports and soccer in the deprived districts of the country for the benefits of our youth”. Meanwhile, Mr. Anderton has appealed for the support of Ghanaians to transform AngloGold Obuasi mine into a world class facility. “As you may be aware, the company is undergoing a major strategic transformation, root and branch, to re-build the Obuasi mine into the greatest mine in the world and we’re counting on all our stakeholders to support us as we pursue this objective”,he noted. Deputy Minister of Education in charge of Pre-tertiary, Elizabeth Amoah Tetteh commended AngloGold Ashanti for supporting government’s efforts in improving education. She appealed to officials of AngloGold Ashanti to upgrade the school to a Senior High School status.