As the Ministry of Finance gathers views from stakeholders ahead of the 2027 Budget, a policy analyst at IMANI Africa, Sitsofe Mensah, is urging policymakers to listen more closely to the people who ultimately pay for almost everything in the economy, who are the consumers.
Sitsofe Mensah argues that unless future Budgets of Ghana give ordinary consumers a stronger legal voice and meaningful protection against unfair pricing, cartels and excessive mark-ups, the national Budget risks becoming little more than a collection of invoices handed to an increasingly vulnerable public.
The concern of the policy analyst is rooted in the everyday realities of many Ghanaian consumers. He narrates that from food and transport to medicines and rent, consumers often have little bargaining power when prices rise. They must either pay the new price or go without.
Meanwhile, the businesses and groups determining prices often have associations, unions, collective bargaining structures or industry policies through which they can organise and protect their interests.
Who Speaks for the Consumer?
According to Mensah, industry receives policy incentives, workers have unions and collective bargaining, while traders can organise through associations capable of influencing market behaviour.
Consumers, however, are largely fragmented. A worker being bullied on transport fare cannot negotiate collectively with a transport operator. A family confronted with rising food prices cannot easily bargain with wholesalers. A patient who needs essential medicine has little choice but to pay whatever the market demands.
This imbalance, Sitsofe Mensah suggests, creates an economy in which the consumer absorbs the cost whenever something goes wrong.
It has become the norm that when production costs rise, prices increase. When supply chains become inefficient, consumers pay. When middlemen add margins, consumers pay again. And when competition is weak, or businesses coordinate prices, the ordinary buyer may have little practical protection.
“From food to transport, to medicine, to rent—everyone else in Ghana is organised, protected, or cartelized. Industry gets policy incentives. Traders get associations to enforce price floors. Unions get collective bargaining,” he recounted.
He added, “But you, the consumer? You are the economic dustbin. You are expected to absorb every drop of market greed, every failure of policy, and every middleman’s markup without a single legal shield to defend you.”
Budgets Must Prioritize Consumers
The analyst’s intervention comes as the Ministry of Finance seeks inputs for the 2027 Budget. For him, consultation should not end with producers, businesses, organised labour and other economic actors. The millions of Ghanaians who ultimately finance the economy through taxes and daily purchases must also have their concerns reflected in fiscal and economic policy.
His argument is essentially that a Budget cannot claim to serve the nation if it systematically listens to those who sell to consumers while overlooking those who buy.
This would mean moving beyond broad promises of lower inflation and economic stability to policies that directly affect how consumers experience the economy.
From the Macroeconomy to the Shopping Basket
The policy analyst maintains that for the ordinary consumer, macroeconomic stability is ultimately tested at the market, pharmacy, fuel station, lorry station, and landlord’s office.
A reduction in inflation does not necessarily make a particular food item affordable. A stronger currency does not automatically translate into cheaper medicine. And economic growth means little to a household whose rent, transport and food bills continue to consume most of its income.
Mensah is therefore calling for consumer protection to become a more explicit part of the Budget conversation.
This could include stronger enforcement against anti-competitive conduct, effective anti-cartel measures, greater scrutiny of excessive pricing where competition is demonstrably weak, and institutions capable of giving consumers a meaningful voice when markets fail.
“If our policymakers want to know what the real expectations are for Budget 2027, this is the raw truth. A budget that consults every seller, every producer, and every union—but leaves the buyer completely naked to exploitation—is not a budget for the nation. It is simply a collection invoice handed to a hostage audience,” he noted.
He insisted that, “Until national Budgets, starting in 2027, equip the ordinary consumer with real legal protections, strict anti-cartel laws, and price-fairness enforcement, the macroeconomic stories will sound sweet in Parliament. Still, the street will remain a crime scene.”
The Bottomline
As government prepares the 2027 Budget, Mensah’s intervention places emphasis on who protects the person who has no union, without any industry association and no bargaining power when the price of everyday life goes up.
If these questions remain unanswered, he warns, successive Budgets may continue to look like the wishes and invoices of organized trade groups, business associations, and producers, without the real welfare of the consumer.
