The Alliance for Integrity, an international multi-stakeholder initiative set up to promote integrity in the private sector, has been launched in Ghana with a call by the Minister of State in charge of Private Sector Development, Honourable Abdul-Rashid Pelpuo, for businesses to embrace integrity to ensure their growth and the development of the business environment.

The initiative is being implemented by the Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

In disclosing the need for stakeholders to support the initiative, he was emphatic that “corruption does not only increase inequality amongst society but it also creates unfair competition and distorts markets”, adding that “in many societies, corruption has achieved a state of equilibrium that cannot be changed by individual actors easily.

This is why I welcome the Alliance for Integrity as a multi-stakeholder collective action initiative.”

Siegfried Leffler, Country Director of GIZ Ghana commended the multi-stakeholder approach being adopted by the Alliance for Integrity. He believes that “an active collaboration among all stakeholders, where they share their experiences and have access to knowledge about integrity will encourage more companies and organisations to pursue it.”

Other speakers at the event, which was held under the theme “Ensuring Collective Action to Foster Integrity in the Private Sector”, included Moses Agyemang, Senior Economist at the Private Enterprise Federation, Dr. Nicole Maldonado, Head of Development Cooperation at the German Embassy in Ghana, and Linda Ofori-Kwafo, Alliance for Integrity Advisory Group Chairperson in Ghana and Executive Director of Ghana Integrity Initiative, the Ghanaian Chapter of Transparency International.

The event also witnessed insightful breakout workshops centred on integrity and facilitated by leading professionals including Christian Muller, Global Compliance Officer, SAP SE (Germany) and member of the Alliance for Integrity’s Steering Committee; Eric Victor Appiah, Director of Benchmarking, Monitoring and Evaluation, Public Procurement Authority, and Wilson Atta- Krofah, Past President Ghana Chamber of Commerce and Industry and CEO of Wileb Mining Supplies.

The official launch was designed to herald the roll-out of the Alliance for Integrity’s main activities in Ghana. Participants at the event included officials of civil society organisations, executives of corporate organisations and representatives of public sector institutions actively involved in the field of compliance and anti-corruption.