Save Ghana’s industrial sector - ICU cries

The Industrial and Commercial Workers’ Union, (ICU)-Ghana, has expressed concern about the myriad of challenges confronting the industrial sector, saying if nothing is done it will spell doom for the economy.

The private companies, the ICU said, were the most affected and expressed the fear that if not tackled with the urgency it deserves, the situation was likely to assume something else.

A statement signed by Mr Solomon Kotei, General Secretary of the Union and copied to the Ghana News Agency on Sunday said: “The problems bedeviling the private sector now are enormous and reveal gloomy picture.”

“Official records of the Union points to the fact that since year 2010, minutes of meetings between the Union and most employers seems to have some amazing commonalities; employers complain bitterly about the threat to their survival with some of them showing the tendency to close down their businesses.

“Some have even gone to the unfortunate extent of notifying the Union of imminent laying-offs”. ICU, as the largest industrial labour union in Ghana, is currently organizing over 75,000 employees in various occupations across the sectors of the economy including those in the informal sector.

The statement said: “Currently, we are struggling to appreciate the threat from employers to embark on redundancy exercise to trim down their workforce as a first measure to salvage the situation.

“Our records show that there is a flood of letters of notification to the Union of layoffs, ranging from three to seventy workers. Our position is that, what is happening to industry now should not be toyed with, especially, when one comes face to face with the reality on the grounds.”

The statement said it was worthwhile to note that the unbridled open market economy in Ghana had, in one way or another, compounded the situation of the local industry. “Ghanaian industries are finding it difficult to attempt any legitimate increases in prices of their products because of the battle with very cheap and substandard imports.

“It is sad to know that we have opened our borders and ports too wide for undeserving foreign goods such that all kinds of things are being imported into the country. We seem to have over liberalized the Ghanaian economy. There is the need to re-examine our national policies with another lense before we are overtaken by events.”

The statement said the perception by some Ghanaians that anything foreign was good was not helping the economy. Resorting to foreign consultants on programmes and projects, even in the face of qualified Ghanaian technocrats, it said, were not helpful for growing the economy.

The ICU, the statement said, had cautioned that the open economy had the potential to kill the textile industry. “Now the Chinese have taken over the market while we look on helplessly as Akosombo and Volta Textiles are virtually strangulated and gasping for support.”

“If we keep saying let’s grow what we eat, let’s eat what we grow, let’s wear what we produce and let’s sell what we produce and these things are still happening, then ICU, just like any other individual, will not need a soothsayer to say that the future is bleak for the economy.”

“So, the ICU as a voice for labour is suggesting to the government, policy makers, and managers of the economy to take practical steps to ensure growth in small-scale industry. Special attention should also be paid to the major companies as they struggle to survive.”

“…the journey to the destination we are hoping for is long, but no matter how long this journey may be, we still would have to take the first step; the time is ripe for us to talk and think through this looming danger and initiate the appropriate measures needed to avert any dire consequences.”