General News of Wednesday, 22 November 2017
Source: www.ghanaweb.com
2017-11-22
Kennedey Agyapong
Controversial politician, Kennedy Agyapong has disputed claims by the former Finance Minister Seth Terkper that the NDC government left a stabilised economy behind.
Mr Terkper made revelations on the Citi Breakfast Show in January 2017 that his government (NDC) had “managed to bring the economy to a point of stabilization and where, as we have been indicating, we have seen a clear turnaround. Growth is increasing; the Cedi has also stabilized considerably since last year. We have seen inflation begin to come down”.
The Member of Parliament (MP) for Assin Central avowed that the NDC rather left the economy in such a poor state that the NPP is making all efforts to fix it as stated in the 2018 budget presented by Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta to Parliament.
Speaking on ‘Badwam Mpensenpensenmu’ on Adom TV, he said “they left a bogus economy…horrible economy. They didn’t know their whereabouts. They were collapsing the country.”
Agyapong took pride in the Finance Minister’s Budget Statement which stated that the annual average rate of debt accumulation of 36.0 percent over the last four years, has declined over the last nine months to about 13.58 percent”.
“…we have started building again. We are serious about the content of the budget.” The MP added.
According to Ken Ofori-Atta, Ghana’s debt to GDP ratio has declined from 73 percent at the end of December 2016 to 68.6 percent at the end of September 2017.
More so, Kennedy Agyapong commended the Finance Ministry’s initiative of injecting $150 million capital to banks to be able to grant loans to investors and businesses but expressed his displeasure with the high interest rates banks charged business entities.
“I commend the Finance Minister’s initiative to inject $150 million dollars to banks but my problem with these same banks is the high interest rate they charge investors and business men.”
For a stronger economy, he suggested that the capital should come with a condition that either the banks reduce their interest rates or provide soft loans to thriving businesses.
