Contrary to opininions from a cross section of the public especially, the Minority in Parliament that the country has been declared HIPC, Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, Minister for Finance has said that the economy is stronger today than it was four years ago, and will continue to grow stronger with four more years to do more for the people of Ghana, with God’s help.
According to him, it was evident to all that the economy had not only been turned around through hard work and innovative policies, but had demonstrated courage to implement a GH¢100 billion GhanaCARES (Obaatanpa) programme.
Speaking at the floor of Parliament to present the 2021 first quarter budget, he indicated that the diligent and disciplined pursuit of the innovative policies the NPP Government restored macroeconomic stability, promoted inclusive growth and transformed the lives of millions of Ghanaians.
He said, some 1.2 million Ghanaians are in Senior High School with almost 3 million of our children in the school feeding program, while the country has not been exporting food through the Planting for Food and Jobs program and 1D1F generating jobs all around.
Mr Ofori-Atta noted that data speaks for itself and used the data to separate facts from opinions in giving the success of our focused macroeconomic stabilization and fiscal consolidation programme.
This he said is evidenced by:
i. growing the economy, at an average rate of 7.0% between 2017 and 2019 as compared with 2.8% between 2014 and 2016;
ii. reducing inflation from 15.4 percent at end-December 2016 to 7.9 percent by the end-December 2019; the lowest since the 4th Republic in 1992;
iii. maintaining an average fiscal balance below a 5% of GDP threshold between 2017 and 2019 as compared to an average of 6.3% in 2014 and 2016;
iv. improving gross international reserves to reach US$8.6 billion or about 4 months of import cover by February, 2020 as compared to 3.5 months of import cover in 2016;
v. successfully exiting the IMF-ECF programme in April 2019 which had been completely derailed by 2016.
He further explained that in the quest to stabilize the economy, it also lowered the rate of debt accumulation, re-profiled our debt, and implemented a number of structural reforms in a transparent manner for an efficient and effective management of public debt.
These significant macro-fiscal gains he said, were achieved in spite of having:
i. paid GH¢12 billion in excess energy capacity charges which we inherited in 2017, and have kept the lights on;
ii. settled substantial part of the GH¢11 billion outstanding arrears bequeathed to us;
iii. abolished 17 unproductive taxes to boost productivity of the private sector;
iv. spent GH¢ 21.6 billion to clean-up a collapsing financial sector and protected 4.6 million depositors and 81,700 investors.
“That is the competent governance, hard work and God’s hand that has delivered us”, he pointed out.
The Finance Minister contended that for fair-minded observers, the above economic indicators were clear evidence of the sharp and stark difference between a competent Akufo-Addo-led Government and others.
Story: Seth Ameyaw Danquah
