Story by: Karen Aryeetey
Market women operating in the Madina, Adenta and Botwe markets are urging the government to channel a portion of petroleum revenues into accessible loan schemes to help them expand their businesses and support their households.
They made the appeal during the maiden edition of the Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC)’s public engagement with market women on the management and use of petroleum revenues.
Speaking at the event, Chairman of PIAC, Richard Ellimah, stressed that engaging market women and other marginalized groups is essential to ensure that the benefits of petroleum revenues reach ordinary citizens.
He said, “it taught us that in our engagements with our stakeholders, we need to encourage them to get down to the level of our market women, speak to them in our local dialects, break down the complex systems around petroleum revenues for them to also express their opinions and share in the national revenues that we get from petroleum.”
He added that the Committee plans to scale up the engagements nationwide, reaching more market centres and marginalized groups through project inspections and district-level outreach.
Queen Mother of Botwe, Beatrice Sowah, said, “the engagement has thrown more light on how government makes use of portions of petroleum revenues to fund some road projects and other national infrastructure projects because we initially believed government solely used its own money for some projects it undertakes.”
Vice Market Queen at the Madina Market, Theresa Ansong, called on government to implement measures that would secure a greater stake for Ghana in the production of the country’s petroleum resources.
She said, “as government is using portions of petroleum revenues to undertake development projects, it should also set aside some of the funds to invest and train its human resource capital. This way, our own people can fully work in our oil and gas sectors without foreign aid.”
The public engagement, organized by the Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC) in partnership with the Africa Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP), brought together market women from the Madina, Adenta and Botwe markets.
The forum forms part of PIAC’s women-focused outreach programme designed to promote gender inclusion in the governance of petroleum resources.
It also sought to help market women better understand how oil funds are used, while creating an avenue for them to share their expectations on priority areas for petroleum revenue spending.
PIAC officials at the forum educated participants on the origins and mandate of the Committee, Ghana’s oil discovery timeline, and how petroleum revenues have been allocated over the years.
With the market engagement at Madina now completed, PIAC hopes to secure additional funding to organise the next engagement at Kaneshie.
