{"id":605032,"date":"2019-04-04T15:54:22","date_gmt":"2019-04-04T15:54:22","guid":{"rendered":"
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Government has been criticised for sacrificing the needs of Ghanaians in order to impress the supervisors of the economy, the International Monetary Fund.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The main opposition NDC represented by a member of its Economic and Finance team, Isaac Adongo said government has tried to bridge the gap between expenditure and revenue by cutting down on spending.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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In essence, government has been saving money to reduce its deficit as part of conditionalities set by the IMF.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

But in doing so, the NPP government has \u201ccontinuously starved the people of Ghana\u201d.\u00a0<\/span><\/span>He said holding on to money has not only brought hardship but has resulted in delayed investment in infrastructure. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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It has postponed the rate at which Ghana can join the elite countries of the world, he complained.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The NDC economic lecture has been billed as the opposition\u2019s response to the government\u2019s Town Hall Meeting addressed by Vice-President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The Vice-President pointed to \u201cefficiency in expenditure management\u201d which had seen the gap between expenditure and revenue – fiscal deficit \u2013 of 6.8% (rebased GDP) in 2016 reduced\u00a0to about 3.8%.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cFor the first time in a decade\u2026our tax revenues exceeded all government spending \u2013excluding debt service for two years in a row\u201d, the Vice-President said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Adongo, however, maintained while there have been efforts to align expenditure with revenue, the IMF is not impressed.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

He said the method used to achieve this has been \u201ccrude\u201d. The IMF, he said, has expressed disappointment in what he said was government\u2019s low revenue generation figures.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Isaac Adongo suggested a better way to bridge the fiscal deficit would have been to mobilise more revenue instead of holding on to expenditure in a country where government spending has ripple effects on businesses and jobs.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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