Member of Parliament for Suame, John Darko, has described the government’s 24-hour economy market initiative as a poorly conceived policy.
His comments come amid resistance to the siting of some proposed 24-hour economy markets across the country.
In Accra, Konkomba Yam traders recently protested against plans to locate one of the markets at a proposed site and appealed to the government to consider an alternative location.
Speaking on Eyewitness News on Friday, August 14, 2026, Mr Darko rejected suggestions that the resistance was mainly due to inadequate stakeholder consultation, arguing that the challenges point to fundamental weaknesses in the policy’s design.
“It’s not a lack of consultation, so to speak. The whole policy of the 24-hour economy market is poorly thought-through,” he said.
According to the Suame MP, the government’s flagship 24-hour economy programme was not adequately planned before the 2024 elections.
“The whole 24-hour economy came after they won the election and realised there was nothing they could do. They could not implement the so-called 24-hour economy,” he said.
Mr Darko recalled that during the election campaign, the NDC promised a system under which economic activity would run in shifts, creating more employment opportunities.
“Remember, during the campaign, they said they were going to establish a 24-hour economy where one job would be done by three people. That’s what they told us. It was a catchy campaign message, but it was not thought through,” he argued.
He further claimed that the government had no concrete plan for implementing the broader 24-hour economy concept and later settled on constructing dedicated markets under the programme.
“There’s nothing that they planned to make this possible. So when they won power, they did not know what to do. Somebody just came up with the idea: why don’t we establish a market called a 24-hour economy market?” he said.
Mr Darko said there was little evidence of businesses operating additional shifts as envisioned under the policy.
“Now we are in the second year of the administration, or getting into the second year, and there’s nobody in this country who is doing a second shift or a third shift.
“People are angry because you come to my area and pull down my market when there is bigger land available to build a new one. You come and pull down an old market to establish a so-called 24-hour economy market,” he said.
