By Musa Adamu
The Senate has mandated its Committees on Foreign Affairs and Trade and Investments to, as a matter of urgency, interface with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to investigate the status of Nigerian businesses in Ghana.
The decision to do so was reached during plenary on Tuesday following the consideration of a motion on “The need to investigate alleged ill treatment and injustices suffered by Nigerian Traders and Businesses in Ghana”.
Sponsor of the motion, Senator Ifeanyi Patrick Ubah (YPP, Anambra South) said many Nigerian businesses were established in Ghana following the desire of the Ghanaian Government to promote trade relations with Nigeria under President Kufour.
According to the lawmaker, the presence of Nigerian businesses created thousands of jobs and contributed to the growth of the Ghanaian economy.
“As at the end of 2010, Nigerian businesses accounted for sixty percent of foreign investments in Ghana from the African continent.
“Of recent, the once flourishing economic relations between Nigeria and Ghana have come under repeated threats as a result of recent hostile posture of Ghanaian authorities and indigenous Ghanaian Traders Union towards Nigerian traders through the adoption of discriminatory regulations aimed at frustrating Nigerian traders and businesses such as the passage of the Ghana Investment Promotion Commission (GIPC) Act,” he stated.
The GIPC Act, according to Ubah, “raised the amount of money in registering businesses owned by foreigners – who are mostly Nigerians – in Ghana to USD$200,000 and further restriction and prohibition of foreigners from trading in particular markets.”
The lawmaker bemoaned what he described as the “molestation of Nigerian traders and other hostile acts directed against Nigerian businesses such as the recent closure of over six hundred shops and businesses belonging to Nigerians carried out by the Ghana Union of Traders Association (GUTA) on December 2, 2019.”
He added that the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC) Act 865 of 2013 prohibits ECOWAS citizens from engaging in Small and Medium scale Enterprises (SMEs).
