It is unfortunate that the system is not protecting the local business any more. The petty trader, the local business owner and the poor retailer have fallen prey to foreigners who are invading the Ghana market as if they own it and it is becoming alarming. It is time to wake up as a country to regulate these practices and all hands must be on deck from the president to the very young citizen because it may trigger down to the a certain level of chaos as the local business owners pile up their grief and pain. As they say, prevention is better than cure. Foreign businesses now dominate about 70% of Ghana’s market, leaving local traders with just 30%, according to the President of the Ghana Union of Traders Association (GUTA), Dr. Joseph Obeng at a program recently. He also said, investment laws were not being effectively enforced, allowing foreigners predominantly Chinese and Nigerians, who are rapidly taking over the retail market. “Our market is gone. Today you realize that those who do the stationary and printing are mostly Chinese. When you go to the likes of Chinatown and China Mall, you see many people are trooping in and out to buy their wares,” he noted. Major retail hubs like Kantamanto, Makola and others have witnessed dramatic demographic shifts as foreign merchants, especially from Nigeria and parts of Asia; establish dominant positions through aggressive pricing strategies. Nigerian traders have particularly succeeded by leveraging high-volume sales and quick inventory turnover to undercut Ghanaian competitors. It will interest us to know that some of them even do not use the ports hence avoiding some taxes that may give the country funds for development. Some use transit methods while others use free zones. Just as Ghana announced through the president that, it was banning all foreigners from trading in its local gold market as part of sweeping reforms aimed at boosting foreign exchange reserves and stabilizing the local currency from May 1 and grants exclusive authority to a new state body, the Ghana Gold Board (Globed), to regulate and control artisanal and small-scale gold mining in a country where illegal mining has become a major issue, the local business owners and traders are calling on authorities to be bold, clamp down on foreigners operating in the retail space, and if possible check their activities, as they also do not follow the minimum wage bill while maltreating workers who are Ghanaians. The retail market, which hitherto was reserved for Ghanaians has now become a safe haven for foreigners, particularly, Chinese traders who flood the market with cheap products. This, is gradually pushing Ghanaian traders and manufacturers out of business and rendering many people including the youth jobless, which goes a long way to increase employment, which will now become the burden of the government. Our mothers are crying, our fathers are wailing. The entire local business is dwindling and the earlier we pay attention to this plea, the better it will be for our future because a stitch in time saves
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