Indigenous investors treated like orphans - Dr Adjei

One of Ghana’s successful indigenous businessmen, Dr Kwabena Adjei, Managing Director of Kasapreko Company Limited (KCL), says governments over the years have treated indigenous businessmen and women like neglected orphans.

This, he said, has resulted in the collapse of hundreds of indigenous companies with bright prospects.

He disclosed this to The Finder in an exclusive interview.

Dr Adjei expressed disappointment that over the years multinationals have negotiated favourable terms with governments, but the same has not been extended to indigenous private companies.

He said the favourable terms offered multinationals often result in good profits for them, but unfortunately, these companies transfer their profits back to their countries, resulting in capital flight, thereby denying the Ghanaian economy the needed liquidity.

He explained that the cost of doing business in Ghana is too high, calling for concessionary interest rates and attractive tax incentives for indigenous companies.

He said the contribution of the manufacturing sector to the country’s growth continues to dwindle as a result of lack of attention from governments.

Dr Adjei stated that Kasapreko is incurring huge costs as a result of the worsening power situation in the country.

He said profits which are supposed to be used in the development or expansion of the company are used to purchase machinery to help power their plants during power outages.

According to him, the inability of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) to provide a reliable load-shedding timetable makes matters even worse.

He said the situation was not encouraging, adding that if not ratified, it could cause many smaller companies who may not be able to absorb the shock to collapse.

To make matters worse, he said the depreciation of the cedi has hurt manufacturers as they import some of their raw materials.

Dr Adjei believes that agriculture and manufacturing hold the key to Ghana’s economic growth, and governments must pay serious attention to these two sectors.

According to him, once the manufacturing sector is weak, Ghana would remain an import-dependent country, a situation that would continue to weaken the cedi.

He called for government’s support to grow local manufacturing companies, as well as the economy.

In 2013, Kasapreko contributed over GH?6 million as Corporate Tax to the economy, and Dr Adjei said this rivals the taxes paid by multinationals.