African Intermediary Cities as Actors and Partners in Urban Migration Governance (Kumasi, Ghana)
The Ghanaian city of Kumasi, with a population of approximately 3.35 million, is the capital of the Ashanti Region and connects the north of Ghana with the south coast. Kumasi is an important destination and transit city for both internal migration and mixed migration from Nigeria to the east and several ECOWAS member countries to the west. Although migration is not a central policy issue in Kumasi, "organic" networks of city authorities, NGOs and community leaders are engaged in many ways on related issues. The Equal Partnerships project's stakeholder mapping shows that while migration is not officially on the local government's policy agenda, many actors deal with migrants in their daily activities beyond official policies, laws and regulations. There is great potential in establishing local-national dialogues to bridge the gap between recently adopted national migration policies and local action on the ground.
