Mr Elikem Nutifafa Kuenyehia
Mr Elikem Nutifafa Kuenyehia, the Chairman of Oxford and Beaumont Solicitors, has encouraged the Ghanaian business community to embrace the culture of partnerships to mobilise enough funding for growth.
Mr Kuenyehia, who is an entrepreneur, a lawyer, academic and a business facilitator, was addressing participants at the 15th MTN Business World Executive Breakfast meeting, in Accra, on Thursday, which focuses on how local businesses could attract and leverage Foreign Direct Investments (FDIs) for growth.
He said FDIs could change the vision and shift the focus of young and local entrepreneurs because investors' interest often dominated the businesses, leaving local managers with very minimal powers to make binding decisions.
He said to ensure meaningful growth, local investments must also be encouraged to secure the visions and aspirations of young entrepreneurs and also promote Ghanaian products and services.
The aim was to catalyse prosperity in Africa by celebrating and promoting entrepreneurship as the surest way for Africa to achieve prosperity and strengthen relationships between leaders in Africa for greater intra-African trade, investment, and collaboration, he said.
Mr Kuenyehia said it was unfortunate that most Ghanaian and African entrepreneurs did not appreciate partnerships but rather wanted to go solo, possibly due to the lack of transparency and proper bookkeeping practices.
He advocated that government create the required environment through strengthened policies, and education- right from the basic level - to encourage entrepreneurship and make people realise the benefits of joint partnerships, to ensure local mobilisation of funding for growth in the business sector.
He also encouraged local entrepreneurs to set aside funds to employ qualified personnel to manage their businesses in order to prevent foreign investors from taking advantage of their ignorance to cheat them.
He also discussed the negative attitudes of Ghanaians and urged that local products and services be patronised and supported to help develop the needed quality that was required.
Mr Kuenyehia said most Ghanaian entrepreneurs were doing marvelously well, but needed to come out of the dim and tell the public about their success stories in order to encourage the youth to emulate.
The Executive Breakfast series, which is in its fifth year, has become the leading platform for executive briefings, networking and business matching platform for Chief Executive Officers, senior management professionals and entrepreneurs in Ghana.
