- Otumfuo Urges Ghanaian Businesses to Anchor Growth on Trust and Accountability
The Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, has urged Ghanaian businesses and institutions to place trust, honesty and accountability at the centre of corporate growth, warning that sustainable enterprises cannot be built on weak ethical foundations.
Speaking at the Ghana Business Leaders’ Conclave at the University of Professional Studies, Accra, the Asantehene said Ghana’s future prosperity would depend not only on enterprise and innovation, but also on the moral quality of leadership in both the public and private sectors.
His remarks formed part of a wider appeal for Ghana to shift from excessive political rhetoric towards productivity, business creation and value generation.
“There is no truer measure of our national progress than the state of the economy,” he said, noting that the economy ultimately determines whether citizens can afford food, shelter, education, healthcare and safety.
The Asantehene argued that Ghana’s development conversation has for decades been too dominated by politics, often at the expense of enterprise and productive work.
“We have had enough of talk,” he declared. “Ghana must now become a nation of builders. We must move from political rhetoric to building business. We must move from slogans to production.”
But Otumfuo’s central warning to business leaders was that enterprise without ethics cannot build lasting institutions.
According to him, the foundation of commerce has historically rested on trust, not only contracts, technology or legal enforcement.
“Business has always been built on trust,” he said. “Long before technology, long before contracts and long before complex legal language, the foundation of business was a simple principle my word is my bond.”
He said integrity must be understood not as a ceremonial value but as a practical discipline reflected in daily business decisions, particularly when profit, power and influence are at stake.
“Integrity is how a person behaves when nobody is watching. It is how a leader acts when power is in his hands. It is how a manager decides when profits are at stake,” he stated.
The Asantehene cautioned business executives against tax evasion, dishonesty and exploitation of workers, warning that unethical conduct by leaders eventually spreads through organisations.
“The honest business leader does not cut corners. He does not cheat the state and then complain that the nation is weak,” he said.
He further warned that leaders who encourage misconduct for corporate gain risk creating the same culture inside their own institutions.
“If a manager teaches workers to cut corners for the business, one day those same workers will cut corners for themselves,” he said.
Otumfuo also took aim at arrogance in leadership, describing humility and collective responsibility as essential to organisational harmony and long-term success.
“Arrogance is not leadership. Arrogance is a hindrance to harmony,” he said, adding that no chief executive should assume that wisdom begins and ends with him.
For Ghana’s private sector, the message is both moral and economic.
The Asantehene said private enterprise must be strengthened to complement the economy’s heavy dependence on the state. But he stressed that businesses seeking public trust, policy support and long-term growth must also hold themselves to the ethical standards they demand from government and society.
That argument comes at a time when Ghana is attempting to rebuild macroeconomic stability after debt restructuring, revive investor confidence and deepen private-sector-led growth.
For policymakers, the emphasis on enterprise speaks directly to the need to create the right enabling environment. Otumfuo said political leaders must provide stability, sound policy frameworks and the conditions for productive economic activity.
But he also made clear that citizens, entrepreneurs, professionals and institutions have a responsibility to create, innovate, build enterprises, generate jobs and add value to Ghana’s natural resources.
The deeper implication of the Asantehene’s message is that Ghana’s economic transformation cannot be driven by government alone. Nor can it be sustained by businesses that seek profit without accountability.
His call for integrity, humility and productive enterprise therefore links two issues often treated separately: corporate ethics and national development.
If businesses evade taxes, exploit workers, manipulate contracts or build internal cultures of dishonesty, they weaken the same economy from which they expect opportunity. If political leaders focus on slogans instead of production, they weaken the private sector that must create jobs and value.
Otumfuo’s remarks therefore place a burden on both sides of Ghana’s development equation.
Government must build a stable and enabling environment. Businesses must build with integrity.
“Business without integrity is danger, leadership without humility is arrogance and prosperity without ethics is fragile,” the Asantehene concluded.
