The claim of the minority that we borrowed on 80 billion GHC is false – Government

General News on Friday, June 7, 2019

Source: citinewsroom.com

2019-06-07

The government has denied the minority's badertions in Parliament that it borrowed more than 80 billion cedis without being accountable.

At a press conference on Thursday, the minority accused the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government of borrowing more than 80 billion cedis without taking anything out of it.

According to the Minister of Information, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, the minority statement is ridiculous and pure propaganda.

Speaking to media in Accra on Friday, the minister explained the reasons for the country's rising stock of debt.

"With regard to external borrowing, all these loans are approved by Parliament in accordance with Article 181 of the 1992 Constitution and Articles 55, 56 and 57 of Law 921 on the management of public finances in which the minority left. You can add up all the loans this administration has made to Parliament and it will not reach $ 80 billion.

"Indeed, if there was a list of loans totaling 80 billion, you will imagine that the minority will raise it now. The reason our stock of debt will be about $ 80 billion today is that it is a nominal stock of public debt and that number includes a number of things. Old loans that are currently disbursed under the mandate of this administration add to the outstanding public debt. This does not mean that our administration has gone to borrow. "

The minority in Parliament had voiced concerns over what it described as the unprecedented level of borrowing under the government's new Patriotic Party (NPP).

In a statement, the minority said the indiscriminate borrowing under the NPP government was a betrayal of the trust placed in President Nana Akufo-Addo and Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia.

"The Minority Caucus is deeply concerned about the ill-considered borrowing of the NPP government. The size of the loans marks a betrayal of the trust that was given to the president after he and his candidate for the vice-presidency then promised not to borrow because, according to them, we had all the necessary resources to finance our development.

"Not only did the insatiable appetite of the President for the loan reveal that this promise was hollow, but it was also demonstrated that he and his team did not possess the skill that they claimed to have to generate domestic revenue to finance the national budget. "

As a member of the finance committee, Cbadiel Ato said the government is mortgaging the future of the country by taking ill-timed borrowing.

He made these comments by speaking to the press today. [Thursday] where he indicated that the total revenues of the government are not enough to settle his debts.

"If we have to pay debts and salaries because they are all statutory, you need more than the total of your income to be able to serve that. I am therefore surprised that the Minister of Finance says that it is not a problem because you can pay for it. You can not pay for this because the total income is not enough to pay your wages and salaries and to pay your debt.

"In reality, the situation is even worse if you take the statutory payment because remember that the total income includes what we have for GETFund, the National Health Insurance Fund and the Common Fund of the United States. district badembly. If you want to eliminate that, you have about 130%, so the situation is bad … Please, do not allow them to use the debt / GDP ratio to convince us. "

The Central Bank recently announced that the county's debt stock had reached 198 million Ghanaian cedis.

Debt accumulation in 2019 includes proceeds from the $ 3 billion euro-USD loan issued by the government in March.

The increase in public debt is related to the rise in interest payments that the government pays on its loans.