<\/p>\n
Yaw Buaben Asamoa<\/strong><\/p>\n DIRECTOR OF Communications of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), Yaw Buaben Asamoah, has said comments by former President John Dramani Mahama on government\u2019s proposed Electronic Transactions Levy, popularly known as E-Levy, are myopic.<\/p>\n The former President is reported to have described the E-Levy as \u201cneither adequate nor viable\u201d, and suggested that Ghana goes back to the IMF after holding broad consultations with stakeholders.<\/p>\n However, addressing a press conference at the NPP headquarters in Accra, Mr. Buaben Asamoah stated that the comments of the former President were myopic, adding that all his observations with Ghana\u2019s economy are the very same things wrong with other economies around the world.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course, he [former President Mahama] is entitled to take advantage of the situation in Parliament, but he needs to come to a quick realisation that the new normal is a far cry from what he knew and experienced before; and that old fashioned assumptions cannot work like before in the current COVID economy.<\/p>\n \u201cAll the things he said are wrong with our economy are the same things wrong with the entire world\u2019s economy because of COVID, which he refuses to appreciate,\u201d he stressed.<\/p>\n Sound Economy<\/strong><\/p>\n Mr. Buaben indicated that rating agencies believe Ghana\u2019s economy is \u201cinherently sound\u201d based on strong performance before and during the pandemic.<\/p>\n According to him, Ghana, before the pandemic, grew from 2016 to 2019 on an average of almost seven (7) per cent per annum of GDP.<\/p>\n \u201cThat inherent soundness,\u201d he explained, \u201cwas what supported us to stay in focus and not drop into negative growth in the year that COVID was very high. We managed to sustain ourselves at four (4) per cent. Even as at last year, our economy had rebounded and growth was above four (4) per cent.\u201d<\/p>\n Rating Agencies<\/strong><\/p>\n Rating agencies, he added, believe that the E-Levy could be a very important part of Ghana\u2019s economic recovery efforts.<\/p>\n \u201cThey [the rating agencies] are saying it in their reports that the E-Levy, when passed, could be a very important part of our recovery efforts. They have also accepted that the 20% cut by the government is important to support that process,\u201d he noted, adding that Ghana\u2019s economy is in a position to grow even faster than before should the issues in Parliament surrounding the E-Levy be resolved.<\/p>\n IMF Prescriptions<\/strong><\/p>\n The NPP Head of Communications also threw a hit at former President Mahama for castigating the government for not having a plan for fiscal consolidation which development partners could buy into.<\/p>\n He said the former President said this without realising that the development community had long accepted the cost-cutting measure of 20% in government expenditure and the E-Levy as the building blocks of the country\u2019s recovery.<\/p>\n \u201cWhere is the lack of a plan that he is mentioning?\u201d Mr. Asamoah quizzed.<\/p>\n He continued that government was already implementing the IMF prescriptions of increasing revenue internally, cutting down waste and managing debt.<\/p>\n BY Nii Adjei Mensahfio<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\t<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Yaw Buaben Asamoa DIRECTOR OF Communications of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), Yaw Buaben Asamoah, has said comments by former President John Dramani Mahama on government\u2019s proposed Electronic Transactions Levy, popularly known as E-Levy, are myopic. The former President is reported to have described the E-Levy as \u201cneither adequate nor viable\u201d, and suggested that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":987079,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[187],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-987078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/987078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=987078"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/987078\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=987078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=987078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=987078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}