General News of Wednesday, 2 March 2022
Source: www.ghanaweb.live
2022-03-02Ghana's economy did not collapse because of COVID-19 – Braimah
Executive Director of Media Foundation for West Africa, Sulemana Braimah
Braimah says govt will go for an IMF bailout with or without E-Levy
Corruption cause of Ghana's economic collapse, Braimah
Our economy was one of the fastest-growing before Covid - Akufo-Addo
Executive Director of Media Foundation for West Africa, Sulemana Braimah, says Ghana's economy has collapsed, and the collapse
Read full articleis not because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to him, the economy has collapsed because of the menace of corruption and the government's misappropriation of the country's resources.
"… the economy is collapsed. Don't blame COVID. COVID did not happen only in Ghana. All countries, including our neighbours, were affected by COVID. It's all because of corruption, mismanagement and PR (public relations) governance," a tweet of Mr. Braimah read.
Sulemana Braimah also has stated categorically that the government will be going for an International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout whether the government implements the E-Levy or not.
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo recently stated that Ghana's economy was one of the fastest-growing economies in the World before the COVID-19 pandemic struck.
"It is encouraging for my government and party, the New Patriotic Party, to recall that the rate of growth of the economy, 5.6%, against the background of the exceptionally difficult circumstances of the COVID-era, is still considerably better than the 3.4% we inherited (in 2016) in calmer times from our predecessor administration.
"… prior to the outbreak of the pandemic, we witnessed average annual GDP growth rates of seven per cent (7%) in 2017, 2018, 2019 and part of 2020, when our economy was then, generally, acknowledged as one of the fastest-growing in the world," 3news.com quoted the president.
Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta has also indicated Ghanaians have two choices, either to accept the E-Levy or the government goes for an IMF bailout,
He added that going for an IMF loan would be disastrous for the country.
"When we were in the IMF programme, we couldn't pay for nurses and teachers; we couldn't hire anymore because there were restrictions on that.
"So, we can deal with them for them to give us advice, but we need not ever get into an IMF programme [again]. If we don't do this E-levy, we're just pushing ourselves in a way that would potentially end up in such a disaster," he said.
Read tweet of Sulemana Braimah below:
