Ghana exits IMF book by year end—Yeboah, Chairman, Senate Committee on Finance
Interesting revelation has emerged on the growing stability of Ghanaian economy in the last 22 months following the submissions of the Parliamentary Committee chairman on Finance, Dr Mark Assibey Yeboah.
Explaining more at plenary in his contributions on the presented 2019 national budget, Dr Yeboah observed that when the NPP took over the administration of government, they were forced to extend the IMF programme started by the previous government, because they have derailed from the programme and missed all targets they agreed with the Fund.
He said after 22 months of the NPP administration all the macroeconomic indicators have improved significantly, which shows a positive outlook for the country, “It is a thing of joy that Ghana would be exiting the IMF programme by the end of 2018 and the government determined not to go back to the programmes.
“Mr Speaker as matter of fact, I have news for them, we are exiting the IMF programme ……you sent us to the IMF, see we are getting the country out of the IMF, you should be applauding our effort”.
The Committee chairman averred that the NPP was delivering on its manifesto promise to provide a competent administration for the people as the Bank of Ghana (BoG) was working hard to clear all the mess in the country’s financial sector to ensure a sound banking system for the country.
On a strong contest, a ranking member of the Finance Committee but from an opposition party, Mr Cassiel Ato Forson, countered that the NPP Eurobond borrowing was used for “chop, chop” since there were no visible projects shown on what the money was for.
He said he did not see any hope for the 2019 budget statement, since this would also end up like the previous ones without achieving anything.
While raising serious concerns about the country’s oil revenue, which he said was not going to the right places, saying the Minister of Finance was encouraging members to breach the Petroleum Management Act, Act 815, he agrued that “The minority will not be part of this budget, which seeks to breach the Petroleum Management Act815”.
According to him, “At the end of September 2018, the net borrowing of government, which should have been GH¢7.7billion had jumped to GH¢9.05billion and also domestic financing had shot from GH¢2.4 billion to GH¢4.1billion”.
He revealed that Ghana’s public debt had increased to GH¢170.8 billion from last year’s figure of GH¢138.8 billion, saying the NPP government has added GH¢32 billion to the country’s debt stock in just 12 months, saying “This mounting debt does not show a government which claim to be competent but a substandard one.”
The opposition chief challenged current administration, pointing out that “Within four years of the John Mahama’s administration from 2013 to 2016 the amount of oil revenue, which accrued to them was GH¢6.56 billion, however from 2017 to 2019 the expected oil revenue that would accrued to the NPP government was GH¢12 billion”.
Accordingly, he queried the NPP administration to show to Ghanaians what they had done with all the oil revenues that they had received since they came to power.
