The General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Fifi Fiavi Kwetey, has debunked the International Monetary Fund’s assertion that Ghana’s economic woes was largely occasioned by external shocks.
The Managing Director of the Fund, Kristalina Georgieva, has maintained that the country’s hardship was occasioned by the Covid-19 pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war and not as a result of bad government policies.
“First the pandemic, then Russia’s war in Ukraine. We need to realize that it is not because of bad policies in the country but because of this combination of shocks, and, therefore, we have to support Ghana,” she said.
According to her, Ghana like many other countries reeling from the aftershocks of the Covid-19 pandemic and the Ukraine war are “innocent bystanders” in this global crisis.
However, Fifi Kwetey disagrees.
Calling the MD’s claims “lies”, he stated that Ghana had been suffering from bad policies long before the Covid-19 pandemic and the Ukraine war.
The global shocks he said, merely exposed the cracks in the economy.
“If Ukraine and Covid were the problem then why were we having problems with this economy even before Covid 2019? Why did the World Bank country director say clearly that the economy of Ghana already was facing serious challenges even before Covid in 2019?
“Why was the cedi depreciating by close to 13% even before covid? Why were we having budget deficits in the region of 7.5, 7% before covid? Why was the debt stock already rising beyond 120 billion level pushing towards 225, 230 billion before covid?” he said.
He stressed that Ghana was not an innocent bystander as the MD describes, and that if so, the country should not be experiencing the kind of economic hardship it is currently facing.
He noted that other countries in the sub-region equally affected by the Covid-19 and Ukraine way are faring better than Ghana.
“What about Nigeria? What about Benin? What about Togo? What about Cote D’Ivoire? What about Burkina Faso? Innocent bystanders? let’s stop these lies. It doesn’t matter who said it, it’s a lie. It doesn’t matter who said it, it’s just a lie,” he said.
According to Fifi Kwetey, the IMF is merely massaging the truth to fit government’s own narrative.
“The IMF is simply trying to … you know what, you’re already in a disgrace, they know that you’re political foes, these are some of the lies you’ve been telling, feeding your country, they say ok if that is what makes you happy we’ll go along with some of them for you as long as you do what we want you to do. But let’s face the truth.
“The truth is this, if we were innocent bystanders then why are the countries surrounding us not having the same condition? Why have they not become a junk economy as we speak? Why is their inflation not above 50% as we speak? Why don’t we have a situation where their debt to GDP has gone over 100% as we speak? Why don’t they have the debt deficit in double digit as we have? Why are their pensioners not picketing unable to know the fortune of their pension funds? So it obviously is not the case,” he said.
Source: Myjoyonline.com
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