THE MARKET REPORT

GAR (now Unique FM) back in the late 1990s had a segment on their Friday morning show called market report with Komivi Amekor. On the market report prices of foodstuff across almost all the markets in Accra was announced; from Makola to Agbogbloshie to Malate market. Komivi read the market report in a sing song-like voice unique only to him and that was his signature on that segment. From the price of an olanka of gari to a bucket of tomatoes, a sack of maize, a bucket of cassava dough, a bunch of plantain to a tuber of yam; you name the food stuff and Komivi would give you the market report. My mum never missed the market report and yet she always chose to shop at Makola and a few occasions Agbogbloshie, even if prices at Makola were slightly higher than the other markets and I never understood that, probably a force of habit which I have unconsciously also learned.

My mum started going to the market with me when I was about age eleven, for me it was an adventure. She would let me hold the market bag till it became heavy then she took over. The sights and sounds of Makola always thrilled me. Market women sitting behind their wares at Makola number 2, shouting to passers-by to come buy their fresh produce while others carry their wares on their head in a pan and actively search for customers. You deserve to be flogged if as a Ghanaian you don’t know how to bargain at the market! It is almost an inborn trait that is horned as one grows older and my mum had perfected that skill. Her back and forth with traders always left me in awe, and she always got good bargains. It wasn’t all fun and joy though when my mum would make us walk further just to get a commodity at a perceived better price and sometimes there wasn’t much difference in the initial offer and what we finally got it at (why mothers do that I just wouldn’t understand). In circumstances like that all one could do was frown and scowl to show displeasure. Irrespective of that I looked forward to my weekly trip to the market with my mum when I was on vacation. Through that I got to know all the nooks and crannies of Makola but I hated Agbogbloshie market. My sister didn’t fare very well on her initiation into the “mother-daughter going to the market” moment but that is a story for another day.

Going to the market these days is less fun, too much human traffic, high levels of noise and filth spilling into the streets. I hardly see mothers with young girls in tow anymore. Going to the market with a child these days is more stressful plus increasing transport fares just doesn’t encourage the practice. Besides as an emerging middle class nation going to the mall with our children is trendier and comparatively safer as compared to them tagging along in the over-populated streets of Makola, Agbogbloshie or Malate where almost everyone is pushing and jostling you.

I don’t hear Komivi’s market report on radio anymore – not that it would make any difference in my purchasing pattern considering the rate at which the prices of food and other commodities keeps galloping – but it formed part of my reasons for loving radio and I miss going to the market with my mum. Times have changed indeed.