Hundreds Of Spare Part Shops Closed Down At Abossey Okai! ---As Shop Owners Were Chased By Banks For Default In Loans Repayment
This reporter can report that hundreds of the automobile-part shops were completely closed down at Abossey Okai.
Freeman Koryekpor 
A visit of Soireenews.com senior journalist to the Abossey Okai on Thursday January 5, 2023, which is a town in the Ablekuma Central District which hosts the largest automobile-parts market of Ghana in the Greater Accra Region has exposed teething economic challenges seriously facing almost majority of dealers in the automobile-parts in the market.
The Abossey Okai neighborhood has variety of workshops for metal engineering and vehicle repairs. It borders the Kaneshie market to the north and Sabon Zango to the south.
However, the market which used to be a busy automobile-parts market of Ghana in the previous years has now turned like a 'ghost market," amidst relentlessly low patronage of the spare parts.
This reporter can report that hundreds of the automobile-part shops were completely closed down at Abossey Okai.
The closure of the shops, this news online gathered was done by the traders to outwit the continuous pressures from their banks which have been chasing them out for default in loans repayment due to the recent high exchange rate and economic doldrums in the country.
Speaking in an interview with Soireenews.com, the frustrated spare parts traders expressed disappointment in President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and his New Patriotic Party (NPP) government for not redeeming their electioneering campaign promises made to them to scrap the duty taxes on exportation of the automobile-parts.
According to them, when the Minister of Finance, Mr Ken Ofori-Atta has read the 2017 budget to announce the abolishing of duties on the exportation of the automobile-parts or spare parts, they had sung praising songs and jubilated and quickly reduced the prices on their automobile-parts in the market.
"Thinking that the current NPP government and Presidential Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo are going to implement the policy of abolishing duty taxes on the exportation of the automobile-parts, the NPP government has refused or failed to do so. And that we are now paying highest duty taxes on the exportation of the automobile-parts than what we have been paying at the time that the National Democratic Congress (NDC) under former President John Dramani Mahama was in power," the spare part dealers lamented.
The Abbosey Okai spare parts dealers who spoke on conditions of anonymity lamented that their businesses have started collapsing since President Akufo-Addo took over from former President John Dramani Mahama in 2017.
Currently, according to them, over 80 percent of shops in Abbosey Okai have been closed down due to the recent high exchange rate and economic doldrums in the country.
Some of the owners of the shops blamed the situation on the high cost of doing business in the country, as a result of high inflation and volatilities in the exchange rate regime.
They also cited high taxes at the port as contributing to the default in repaying their loans.
They pointed out that lot of spare part traders went to secure loans to import goods to the market, adding that due to the high cost of port duties and the unstable exchange rate regime, "we are compelled to increase prices but at the end, customers don’t buy and we lose flatly."
According to them, many of their colleagues who closed down their shops have to leave the country in search of better opportunities to pay back their loans.
“ We are in crisis now, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has deceived us and we have regretted of voting for him.The abysmal performance of the cedi is compelling traders to go out of business.President Akufo-Addo is collapsing our businesses because he didn't have what it takes to employ the effective fiscal interventions to stable the national economy.
"Look (referring this journalist) we are telling you today that a lot of spare parts dealers in Abossey Okai are travelling outside the country to look for better conditions. Why operate a shop here when you can’t break even," they lamented.
They maintained that unless effective fiscal interventions are employed by the government to get the economy out of the doldrums and create the atmosphere for entrepreneurs, the situation would remain dire.
They attributed the rate at which the Cedi is relentlessly losing its value against major international currencies to the fact that unauthorized dealers are allowed to illicitly operate and control the forex bureaux sector.
They fumed that there is no centralized body governing the currency trading market; instead, non-nationals are allowed to operate in the foreign exchange and money transfer business.
They challenged the government to review the Forex Bureau policy in order to allow the Central Bank to supervise and streamline the sector to enable them address the emerging fiscal challenges.
“The government can pump billions of Cedis to stabilize the Cedi in cushioning traders but if the foreign exchange and money transfer business isn’t regulated, the situation in the financial sector would remain the same.
“In all the countries that I have travelled to, it is only the banks that are allowed to conduct foreign exchange and money transfer business, so our advice to the government is that they should let the banks supervise the Forex Bureau otherwise the Cedis will continue to dwindle,”they reiterated.
