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Business news for Friday, October 23, 2020
Source: www.ghanaweb.com
2020-10-23
File photo of the AfCFTA Secretariat in Accra
After the new coronavirus pandemic derailed the start date for the implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), another unexpected event in the content threatens the new date for the start of the agreement.
The COVID-19 pandemic forced an implementation schedule from July 1, 2020 to January 2021, but economist Dr. Lord Mensah fears that violent protests in the continent’s largest economy, Nigeria, will be a disaster. .
“It’s going to slow things down. The essence of the AfCFTA is to ensure that we exchange with each other. If you look at Nigeria, it is a very large economy with a huge impact on the African continent. Nigeria has taken over South Africa now when it comes to economic size. So if we go to trade and the biggest player, which is Nigeria, is in trouble, then obviously it will affect the timing of the continental trade deal, ”he told GhanaWeb.
The Senior Lecturer at the University of Ghana Business School (UGBS) responded to GhanaWeb on Friday 23 October 2020 about the implications of the violent EndSARS protests that have raged in Nigeria for weeks and spread to other states. .
Violent protests by tens of thousands of young people in Africa’s most populous country against police brutality have hit many sectors of the economy hard.
Young people have been demanding the abolition of the Federal Special Anti-Theft Squad (SARS), which has been accused of illegal arrests, torture and extrajudicial executions.
The violent escalation of October 20, 2020 in Lagos, which resulted in multiple deaths, further agitated the protesters.
On Thursday, President Mahamadu Buhari addressed the nation in an attempt to calm things down, but it is not known whether the protests will stop now.
Dr. Mensah said that with some key sectors of the Nigerian economy affected by the protests, AfCFTA as an establishment is likely not to be spared.
“Although the inter-trade activity could start, we may not see the actual activity until these issues are resolved in the Nigerian environment,” he told GhanaWeb.
AfCFTA is the flagship project of the African Union Agenda 2063, which is expected to create a market of 1.2 billion people with a combined GDP of $ 3 trillion.
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