The Minority in Parliament has slammed the handlers of the economy for being economic with the truth and current state of the economy particularly performance of the Cedi.
According to them, government has failed to tell Ghanaians about the causes of the failing Cedi and suggest that government should admit their inability to manage the economy.
Speaking at a press conference organised by the Minority in Parliament on Wednesday, Bolgatanga Central MP, Isaac Adongo, said government is not being truthful about the Cedi rate currently.
He said, checks by himself and other minority members indicate that Cedi was trading at GHC5.65 to a Dollar instead of the GHC5.3 put out by some government officials on social media.
The Cedi has been said to be appreciating over the last two days after falling drastically in the first three months of the year, 2019.
It started the year at about GHC4.8 and hit a record low of GHC5.83 earlier in the month of March but the trend seems to be reversing even though the Minority insists it is not real.
Isaac Adongo stressed that, “clearly this is not a joking matter and we want to sound a note of caution that this social media gimmick of manipulating exchange rate and putting it out there, today I saw GHC5.3 and then they do something and say that because we said we were going to do this programme the cedi got angry and started strengthening and that it is now GHC5.3. I think when I was sitting here, I and my colleagues were doing some checks. ADB is trading at GHC5.65, that is very high. And yet they are using social media. You cannot solve the challenges of our country with propaganda. You use propaganda to win power and you want to use propaganda to manage the economy. So we are in very serious challenges.”
He wasn’t enthused about government’s issuance of a Euro bond explaining that it adds to the country’s debt stock and further makes the country’s already vulnerable status more challenging.
Investors, he noted will be quick to withdraw their investments if they find out that there is not many dollars circulating in the system because of government’s inability to raise enough funds.
The Minority also predicts an economic crisis in the nearest future because of government’s handling of the situation now.
Isaac Adongo said the tendency of government to spent all it raises through taxes and grants on paying compensation, settling interests on matured debts and settling statutory payments leaving no revenue for infrastructure could spell doom for the nation.
The Bolgatanga MP asserted that the performance of the Akufo-Addo led NPP government on infrastructure could be likened to the period between 2001-2009 when the party was in power.
“We were spending 4.5% of whatever we generated on building infrastructure for the future. Today inflation has gone up, we have had inflation for the past two years so on the average you should be increasing beyond 7.5 billion In order to achieve real 7.5 in 2016. Unfortunately, they did 4.5 billion in 2018. So infrastructure will be deteriorating, you will not find more roads, you will not find more schools, you will not find more investments in the power sector and at the end of the day, just like they did from 2001-2008 the NDC will come and do the difficult job of rebuilding the infrastructure once more. So the truth is that the economy is heading for crisis. If you continue like this till 2020 it will mean that even the money we are borrowing will be consumed by just three for items and that is how scary our fiscal situation looks like,” the Minority stated.
Government has rejected the predictions of the minority and insists they are on top of issues and on track in delivering a sound economy.
By: Jonah Eledi/awakenewsonline.com
