External debt exchange may be better managed than DDEP – Deloitte Ghana official

Financial Advisor at Deloitte Ghana, Yaw Appiah Lartey says the country’s External Debt Exchange Program is likely to be better managed than the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP).

According to him, considering the government’s engagements so far with the external creditors an understanding may be reached smoothly and better as compared to the domestic debt exchange program.

This comes on the back of President Akufo-Addo’s appeal to the Diplomatic Community to help Ghana’s move for the $3 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout.

Addressing members of the Diplomatic Corps at the Peduase Lodge in the Eastern Region, President Akufo-Addo indicated that just as the nation managed to achieve a staff-level agreement with the Fund in record time in December 2022, whose terms were systematically fulfilling including the difficult “but ultimately highly successful process of the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme.”

Commenting on the development on the Morning Starr with Naa Dedei Tetteh, Mr. Lartey indicated that the process will not be chaotic like we experienced around the DDEP.

“The external debt is likely to be better managed than the domestic debt. We were caught by surprise when we were given the terms of the program before the consultation started. We have seen letters written by the consortium of external creditors. They have formed the consortium, appointed legal and financial advisors even before the government started this program. So, we are going to have much cleaner, open and transparent forces of negotiation on the international level than we have on the local level,” Mr. Lartey opined.

He continued, “With the domestic debt, we were forced to form these associations and various groups after the program was announced. But for the external creditors, they formed a consortium and appointed a legal advisor. They sent a communication to the government even before the discussion. So, for that path I am sure that the process will go quicker. They should have a process that is more structured than we had with our domestic debt program. So, I don’t expect to see a lot of hitches and a lot of challenges as we had with our domestic debt.”