By Hafsa Obeng
Accra, April 16, GNA – The Ghana Hotels Association (GHA) has outdoored it upcoming 50th Anniversary celebration with various activities to commemorate the celebration.
The Anniversary would be on the theme “50 years of advocacy, 50 years of perseverance, and 50 years of impacting Ghana’s tourism and hospitality.”
Mr Edward Ackah-Nyamike, National President (GHA), said the association was formed in 1975, to bring hotel owners together and find the right environment for the industry to operate in.
He said it was also targeted at achieving a well-resourced, and well-organized association that would be strategically positioned to influence the creation of an economic environment that allowed hotels to flourish.
“It aims to be an association which is able to influence the economic and business environment, and allow hotels to flourish. In achieving that, we undertake a lot of activities, key among them, advocacy.”
Mr Ackah-Nyamike said the Association prided itself as the original mouth piece of the hotel industry in Ghana and also undertook information dissemination, capacity building, platforms of networking, participate in policy formulation and negotiate with regulators.
He said the hotel industry drove tourism, provided direct and indirect employment, yet was one of the low-hanging fruits in terms of employment in the country.
He said 50 years in the life of any association was no mean achievement, thus the Association had outlined four key activities to commemorate the celebration.
“These include, a 10-kilomiter health walk in Ho, from the Ho regional office to the Jubilee Park, on Thursday April 24. There would also be the unveiling of the anniversary cloth in Tema and a donation to the Tema General Hospital, on July 24.”
Other programmes include a symposium which would be on the theme for the celebration, in October in Cape Coast, and finally the awards ceremony which would be held in January 2026, in Accra.
The GHA President later outlined some concerns of the Association, calling on the sector minister to take the organisation of the Public Private Partnership Forum serious, in order not to violate Section 42 of the Tourism Act 817.
Some of the concerns include the utilization and status of the Tourism Development Fund, 2025 budget and hotel taxes, utility tariffs, import duties, issues with regulatory bodies, AirBnB operations, copyright royalties, among others.
He urged government to collaborate with the hotels to see how best to role out the 24 hour economy since they had been operating such services for years, as well as the Blackstar Experience.
Mr Ekow Sampson, Deputy Chief Executive Officer, (CEO) Ghana Tourism Authority, in Charge of Operations congratulated the GHA for its achievements over the years, saying they had contributed in shaping Ghana’s tourism sector.
He said the hotel industry had grown very fast from about 580 hotels across the country in 1996 to about over 5,000 across the country. “It shows how far the industry has moved and shaped the tourism industry.”
He assured that the GTA would continue to work together and support the GHA in all it’s endeavours to be able to achieve more in the next 50 years ahead.
Prof. Kobby Mensah, CEO, Ghana Tourism Development Company, said the hotel industry was very important to the sector and there were dynamic ways in which the GTDC could support, particularly through innovation technology.
He said the Company was building a very robust, strategically oriented Ghana tourism marketplace, which would help generate enough revenue to support trade associations, and take over the online tourism platform.
Prof. Mensah congratulated the GHA for its achievements and assured them of their full support, saying “ I can tell you the GTDC team now, quite dynamic young people, will put all our support behind this industry to work.”
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