The Ghana Union of Traders Association (GUTA) is urging government to replicate Nigeria’s decision to protect its market from smuggled goods.
Nigeria in the past weeks has closed its borders to Benin in a bid to curb smuggling.
The closure has had a knock-on effect on Ghanaian traders who also use the route.
Speaking to Citi News, the President of the Association, Dr. Joseph Obeng said Ghana should learn from Nigeria and also sanitize its sector.
“We must also learn and follow suite and make sure that we all bring sanity to the ECOWAS Protocol which has brought a lot of malpractices so that we can also clear our borders. Nigeria has started clearing their borders because they think that with the ECOWAS Protocol they are handicapped to open their borders so they have to forcibly close them,” he said.
Mr. Obeng also stated that since Ghana also has similar problems “our border should also be closed down because the goods that are not allowed to go to Nigeria will eventually find their way to Ghana.”
“The authorities must wake up and make sure that they do everything possible not to allow those goods smuggled in to hurt our economy,” he added.
He stated that the closure of the Nigerian border is affecting Ghanaian traders because the Nigerians didn’t give any prior notice.
“Ordinarily, this will not be a bother had they communicated earlier to our Foreign Ministry. They did not give any communique to that effect. So, they can’t wake up one day and close the border while people have already entered and bought their goods while the goods are already locked at the other side for almost 3 months. This is not fair,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Foreign Affairs Ministry has assuaged the fears of the Association over the effect of the closure of Nigeria’s borders to member countries of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) stating that it is being handled with the best of methods.