No data shows hardship in Ghana is due to Russia-Ukraine war – Simon jabs Akufo-Addo

Vice President of IMANI Africa, Bright Simons, has refuted the claim by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo that the Russia-Ukraine war is the main cause of the difficulties in Ghana and other African countries.

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, during his speech at the

Read full articleUnited Nations (UN) General Assembly, said that the Russia-Ukraine War was having a devastating impact on Ghana and other African countries.

“As we grappled with these economic challenges, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine burst upon us, aggravating an already difficult situation. It is not just the dismay that we feel at seeing such deliberate devastation of cities and towns in Europe in the year 2022, we are feeling this war directly in our lives in Africa.

“Every bullet, every bomb, every shell that hits a target in Ukraine, hits our pockets and our economies in Africa. The economic turmoil is global with inflation as the number one enemy this year,” the president said.

But speaking at the 2022 Baah-Wiredu Lecture in Accra, Bright Simons argued that the president's assertion is not backed by data.

He intimated that there is evidence that Ghana is performing worse than other Africa surrounding it which means that there is more to the country’s challenges than the Russian-Ukraine war.

“When we start to do the comparative analysis, you cannot use some other factor that has had a uniform effect. I tried my best to give you factors that could have shown that Ghana has been affected more, and as you saw I struggled with the data.

“I went to jobs, I went to growth, I went to how many people were killed and none of it bears out that we were affected worse. So, if you are the worse performing in terms of currency, you cannot complain and say it is because of some factor that has affected everybody uniformly. It is as simple as that,” he said.



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