'There are too many road barriers along the borders' - deputy Minister

Sunyani, July 27, GNA - Dr. Charles Yaw Brempong-Yeboah, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Regional Integration and NEPAD has said there were too many roadblocks jointly mounted by the Police, Customs and the Immigration Service along the country's frontiers. He held that some of the roadblocks had nothing to do in ensuring national security and public order, adding that they rather slowed down significantly intra-regional trade by increasing costs and reducing the competitiveness of local products.

"Such barriers could even encourage smuggling and other unorthodox trading activities," Mr. Brempong-Yeboah said at a workshop for border operators drawn from Brong-Ahafo, Ashanti and Northern regions. The workshop, organised by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), was attended by officials of the Ghana Immigration Service, Customs, Excise and Preventive Service (CEPS) and the Ghana Immigration Service. It was aimed at sensitizing participants on the implementation of ECOWAS protocols on free movement of persons, goods, services and right of establishment among member states.

Mr. Brempong-Yeboah said results of an improved road transport governance surveillance undertaken by the West African Trade Hub between October and December 2007 revealed that on the Tema-Ouagadougou highway alone, 24 roadblocks had been mounted. There are 24 check points between Ouagadougou and Bamako and 17 between Lome and Ouagadougou, he added. Mr. Bremong-Yeboah said there was urgent need for citizens, goods and services of the sub-region to move freely across member states to boost intra-regional trade and generate maximum socio-economic benefits. He said to accelerate the implementation of the protocol on free movement in the sub-region; the European Union was funding the establishment of joint border posts to facilitate transit procedures at the borders. Mr. Brempong-Yeboah explained that as part of the process towards the promotion of ECOWAS protocols relating to free movement, regional infrastructure, inter-state road facilitation and good governance programmes had been developed and that plans were underway to construct rail tracks between Lagos and Accra, linking Cotonou and Lome.

Mr. Ignatius Baffour-Awuah, Brong-Ahafo Regional Minister, said integration measures such as liberalization of international trade, adoption of common tariff for ECOWAS member countries and coordination of investment policies would make the regionalization of import substitution policies more viable. He expressed regret that for 30 years, ECOWAS had spent a substantial part of its existence on the resolution of crises in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Niger, Cote d'Ivoire, Guinea Bissau and Togo and that much had not been achieved as far as the objectives of the grouping were concerned.

Mr. Baffour-Awuah noted that the challenge with intra-ECOWAS trade was that member states mainly produced the same commodities and cited Ivorian plastic goods competing against their Nigerian counterparts in the Nigerian market and vice versa. He said integration as a penultimate step in trade liberalization involved industrial complementation and opening up of domestic markets.