President Nana Akufo-Addo has told parliament in his State of the Nation Address for 2022 that a new state-of-the-art assembly plant with the capacity to assemble 5,000 new vehicles per annum has been established by Nissan in Tema, which is currently producing Nissan and Peugeot brands of vehicles for the Ghanaian and West African markets.

“I will have the pleasure to commission this new plant in Tema tomorrow [Thursday, 31 March 2022]”, the President announced to Parliament on Wednesday, 30 March 2022.

He said three other vehicle manufacturers, namely KIA, Hyundai and Renault are also expected to commence commercial production this year.

According to him, “quite a number of global vehicle manufacturing companies have set up assembly plants here in our country, and started producing vehicles for our market and for the West African market”.

He said the “well-defined Ghana Automotive Development Policy we outdoored in August 2019 has facilitated this welcome development”. 

The President noted that since June 2021, “Toyota and Suzuki brands of vehicles are being produced here, commencing with the production of Hilux Pickup and Swift models”. 

Also, he noted, “VW and Sinotruck, which commenced commercial operations in 2020, have continued to assemble their brands of vehicles and are enjoying significant local patronage”.

Additionally, Mr Akufo-Addo indicated: “Our national iconic automobile brand, the Kantanka brand produced by Kantanka Automobile Company Ltd., also stepped-up production of its made-in-Ghana vehicles which include Nkunimdie SUV, Omama Pickup, Onantefo 4x4 Pickup, Otumfuo SUV and K71 Small SUV models”.

“Now that the Minister for Finance has announced an embargo on the importation of 4x4 vehicles for official use, I hope the local assembly plants will take full advantage of the opportunity especially since government is continuing with its policy of giving first priority to locally assembled vehicles in respect of all publicly financed procurement of vehicles”.