The writer
Over the centuries, the world has seen fierce power competition even post thawing of the cold war. Our nation’s main commercial partner is China, with $14.1 billion in trade in 2025.
America’s 2025 National Security Strategy has elevated Africa from a peripheral role in its grand strategy to a vital battleground for global contestation and an important partner in economic resilience. Both Washington and Beijing want Accra’s cooperation to make concessions. The question is whether we have a strategy coherent enough to extract them.
For now, we don’t quite extract enough and our engagement with significant partners occurs on an ad-hoc basis, reacting to opportunities as they surface rather than orchestrating them within a cohesive national plan.
In fact, during the China Opportunity for Africa Businesses Forum in February 2026, business leaders stated explicitly that Ghana must evolve past inconsistent trading practices and adopt a resolute, long-term approach, engaging from a strategic rather than sentimental standpoint. That is both a diagnostic and a recommendation.
The Ghana-China relationship highlights the dilemma, and the degree of entanglement is noteworthy. We have over hundred (100) Chinese-owned or joint-venture manufacturing enterprises working in Ghana, a Chinese-majority plant generating close to twenty percent (20%) of the nation’s electricity, and a debt exposure that exceeds $17 billion.
Given this, the IMF has had cause to caution Ghana over potential Chinese seizure of Ghana’s oil, cocoa, or bauxite etc. as compensation should the nation renege on its financial obligations. This does not establish a cooperation of equals. It forms a creditor-debtor nexus with effects on sovereign wealth — the specific consequence that a strategic framework aspires to circumvent.
This does not mean Ghana must break with China. Ghana should change its engagement strategy. The $14.1 billion bilateral commerce may appear impressive, but Ghana largely exports cocoa beans, gold, and bauxite and buys manufactured goods. A country that trades raw gold for gold jewellery is not developing riches. A state that exports cocoa beans and buys chocolate boosts another country’s manufacturing industry with its agricultural labour. Ghana must structurally evolve to process its resources domestically before exporting them for economic and geopolitical reasons.
Ghana’s abundant vital minerals serve as its most powerful new negotiating chip. The country, which recently discovered commercial lithium resources, has joined Namibia and Zimbabwe in forbidding the export of unprocessed key minerals to strengthen resource sovereignty. These resources are critical to the United States, China, the European Union, Japan, and the Gulf states. Agreements on key minerals with Washington can increase their commercial appeal and encourage investment in the value chain. The United States does not outperform China as a partner; however, an agreement on vital minerals with Washington gives Ghana a viable alternative to Chinese investment, which serves as leverage. Ghana should not be underestimated, especially since it can refuse customers.
The digital space merits comparable importance to the real marketplace. The resolutions Ghana establishes now concerning its payment infrastructure, digital currency design, and regulatory environment for digital assets will determine the conditions of its economic integration for decades to come.
A Ghana that enables its national financial system to be influenced by foreign fintech platforms or digital assets is a Ghana that has surrendered its monetary independence through digital avenues. Consequently, the VASP statute and the eCedi project transcend conventional financial regulation – they embody sovereignty policy.
Constructing Ghana’s digital financial infrastructure on indigenous and African principles is equally significant as identifying the partners that handle lithium processing.
Notably, the success of international policies is dependent on a strong domestic front. Everything that follows is built on this foundation. The debt crisis of 2022 gave creditors leverage over Ghana’s sovereign wealth. This case demonstrated how monetary mismanagement may transform economic subservience into political weakness. Given the economic crisis, Ghana lacked the ability to bargain on an equal footing with other states. Ghana’s economic stability determines its ability to negotiate with all parties.
In summary, the strategic framework that emerges is one of indispensability, rather than alignment. We should distribute the trade partner base to prevent any single entity from dominating significant sectors.
Enhancing the value chain is essential for every collaborative engagement. We must maintain fiscal prudence to safeguard bargaining leverage and cultivate domestic demand independently of external markets through the African Continental Free Trade Area.
Finally, Ghana must establish digital and resource autonomy to ensure the digital economy does not compromise physical sovereignty.
Major powers will vie for influence regardless of Ghana’s invitation. The inquiry pertains to whether to engage with these players as a strategic actor with a national strategic framework or as a passive participant accepting the terms of others.
The nation that secures this right is neither a Chinese client nor a subordinate ally of America. It is an autonomous economic entity that utilises significant power competition to fund its development on its own terms and pace.
By Samuel Koranteng Adjei (Executive Director), The Nyansa Institute For Strategic Dialogue
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