Razak Kojo Opoku
A member of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Razak Kojo Opoku, has noted that former President John Mahama’s decision to take Ghana to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 2015 was occasioned by “fiscal indiscipline”, saying Mr Mahama went to the IMF because of misuse and waste of resources.
He said the fact and data from IMF support the narrative that former President John Mahama actually went to the bail-out because of “fiscal indiscipline anchored on pure incompetence and not because of inadequate resources”.
“According to the IMF, the NDC government under John Mahama came to the IMF for economic bailout because of fiscal indiscipline due to the mismanagement of the economy, domestic economic crisis caused by ‘dumsor’, lack of investor confidence due to poor economic indicators and conditions, and waste of public funds influenced by ‘create, loot and shar’e scheme,” he said in an article.
Mr Kojo Opoku noted that before Mr Mahama had considered going to the IMF in 2014/2015, he, in his State of the Nation address to Parliament on Thursday, February 21, 2013, declared to Ghanaians: “…. Mr. Speaker, the meat is now down to the bones and it is time for serious rethinking…,” he quoted.
He recounted that John Mahama, on July 24, 2021, publicly opined that, “Prof. Mills’ legacy in Ghana’s economic history is unmatched”. The former President added: “Although the Presidency of the late Prof. Mills was a short one, the level of socio-economic development chalked under his tenure cannot be overstated”.
Abysmal performance
He further pointed out that Mr Mahama had inherited economic growth of 14% from Prof. Mills, stressing that “before John Mahama left office in December 2016, the economic growth of Ghana was 3.37%”.
He said the economic growth under the 4-year mandate of John Mahama, without global economic crisis such as COVID-19 and Russia-Ukraine war, were 7.31% in 2013; 2.86% in 2014; 2.12% in 2015 and 3.37% in 2016.
Mr Kojo Opoku added that the Akufo-Addo’s government inherited 3.37% economic growth from John Mahama, and quickly increased it to 8.13% in 2017.
“John Mahama inherited a single digit inflation rate of 8.8% from Prof. Mills and before John Mahama left in December 2016, the inflation rate of Ghana was 15.4%,” he pointed out.
He, however, indicated that at the end of the first 4-year mandate of Akufo-Addo’s government, the inflation rate of 15.4% inherited from John Mahama had been reduced to 10.4% in December, 2020.
Resource misuse
In his view, John Mahama inherited massive resources from Prof. Mills, coupled with good economic indicators, which was a good condition to lead the economy on the path to development.
“Sadly and unfortunately, these resources were misused or wasted on the payment of judgement debts, Woyome scandal, Isofoton scandal, Gyeeda scandal, NSS scandal, Brazil World Cup scandal, SADA scandal, Bus branding scandal, Airbus scandal, among others. Indeed, John Mahama’s administration chopped all the bones and meat of the national economy of Ghana before leaving office on January 6, 2017,” he lamented.
He therefore emphasised that the opposition NDC had it all wrong to state that Mahama went to the IMF because of lack of enough resources at his disposal.
“This is clearly a myopic thinking. One may ask, what resources did John Mahama pass on to Akufo-Addo to work with on January 2017? Is it the economic bone resources? For the avoidance of doubt, Akufo-Addo’s government is seeking IMF support because of the adverse impact of global COVID-19 and Russia-Ukraine War,” he added.
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