Nigeria, Ghana relations will enhance stability in West Africa

Nigeria and Ghana have come a long way. Both countries have had good relations even from the pre-colonial to colonial times. With independence, the relationship was deepened, and although it has always been fraught with tensions, competitions, and sometimes, petty rivalries, it is still as solid as it has ever been and its peoples accept and recognise this.

Nigeria and Ghana both account for 61% of West-Africa’s population and 68% of ECOWAS GDP. As the two largest economies in West Africa, the relationship between Nigeria and Ghana is a crucial one for the region if it is to be able to play any role in global markets. The companies in these countries need the opportunities that regional markets provide in terms of operations expansions, increase production and growth.

However, West Africa is weakly integrated and highly deficient in translating political commitments into policy and regulatory reforms. In the case of Nigeria and Ghana, there is rather a long list of such constraints.

Top on the list is the long-standing dispute about the activities of Nigerian traders in Ghana which has been reported as discriminatory due to the law which stipulates that trading enterprises either wholly or partly owned by a non-Ghanaian, and involved only in the purchasing and selling of goods, can operate if they invest at least US$300,000 and employ at least ten Ghanaians. Also, Ghanaian exporters complain mostly about the difficulties in accessing the Nigerian goods market due to unfavorable product registration process, trouble in transporting their goods across the borders of Benin and Togo and also corruption in the Nigerian customs. These complaints run contrary to the existing ECOWAS treaties and protocols.

These are unacceptable because such things constitute obstacles to free trade and the economic growth and development of the region. The Ghanaian government must remember that the Nigeria government have, on several occasions, demonstrated some sense of good neighbourliness at some critical moments in Ghana’s history.  During the reign of former president Olusegun Obasanjo, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) had to be made to supply crude oil to Ghana at some concessionary prices when her economy was running into difficulties during the period of John Kuffour.

It is therefore a good thing that President Muhammadu Buhari recently visited Ghana. It is hoped the visit would go a long way to smoothen the grey areas in the relationship. He has gone a step further by directing that all the challenges that are impeding the trade and economic relations between the two countries be discussed at the next Nigeria- Ghana joint Commission.

Ghana is perhaps one country in Africa that harbours more Nigerians outside Nigeria in Africa. Many Nigerians in Ghana have perhaps lost their identities and have finally settled down in the country as citizens. Nigerians are particularly heavily represented in commerce in the country; hundreds of thousands of Nigerians are thought to work as small-scale market traders.

It is also critical  for the  two countries  to have a robust relationship in these days that security have become a major issue because if  the two can  collaborate  on both  trade, economy, and security issues, the entire region  would  be better  for. The two would have no problems bringing the other countries in the region into their fold.

Besides, Nigeria also play a  very significant  role in energy  supply to Ghana as the  West  African Gas Pipeline  which transverse  the countries of Benin, Togo and berthed in Ghana is a major source of gas supply to the  country’s power sector.

As the two largest economies in West Africa, the relationship between Nigeria and Ghana is a crucial one for the region. Trade ties are particularly important, and Nigeria’s high level of liquidity serves as an important source of capital for Ghana.

Nigeria was Ghana’s third-most-important trade partner in 2010, accounting for almost 10% of total Ghanaian foreign trade. Ghana, in turn, was Nigeria’s ninth-largest trade partner in that same year, accounting for some 1.3% of Nigerian trade (including 1.9% of exports). Nigeria has also been a very important source of investment in Ghana.

In recent years, for example, several Nigerian banks have opened shops in Ghana, as has the Nigerian telecommunications company Globacom. Nigeria-Ghana economic relations soared in the 1990s with the balance of trade heavily tilted in favour of Nigeria. While Nigeria’s exports to Ghana have been predominantly in the oil and service sectors, 25 per cent Ghanaian exports to Nigeria have been dominated by manufactured goods such as garments and textiles, food and beverages, plastics and aluminium, pharmaceuticals and other manufactured products, all in the non-oil sector.

It is therefore time for Nigeria and Ghana to firmly tackle all factors militating against smooth trade and economic relations. This is a panacea for the West-African region to develop economically and become relevant in the global markets.