Minority predicts total collapse of the Ghanaian economy

daniel russell

July 30, 2015 10:27 AM

The Finance Minister, Seth Terkper in his midyear budget review statement in Parliament, disclosed that the current debt stock of the country stood at ninety billion Ghana cedis representing 67.53 per cent of GDP.

I'm not responsible for the dismissal of Ministers - Akoto Osei

The Minority in Parliament has said that the Ghanaian economy is likely to collapse as Greece’s unless the high debt stock of the country is addressed.

The Finance Minister, Seth Terkper in his midyear budget review statement in Parliament, disclosed that the current debt stock of the country stood at ninety billion Ghana cedis representing 67.53 per cent of GDP.

The minority at a press conference in Accra on Wednesday, stated that government’s continuous borrowing from both the domestic and the international markets will have dire consequences for the economy. According to them, the current state of the economy will worsen if government continues borrowing to service its debt.

“For a nation that inherited a debt stock of 9.5 billion in January 2009, that is 85 % of what the NDC inherited from the NPP administration,” said Dr. Anthony Akoto Osei, Minority Spokesperson on Finance.

“At Ghana’s current debt, each of us- the 25 million Ghanaians owes 3,600 Ghana cedis,” he declared, “This debt does not include 1.5 billion dollars or 5.2 billion cedis Eurobond transaction that is expected to close by the end of September as well as the over 300 million dollars amount of loans that was recently approved by this parliament.”

“But they have borrowed so much that if you look at the pictures on CNN, it is evident that the Greeks don’t have control over their economy,” he added.

Greece’s debt crisis was said to have been triggered by the structural weaknesses in the country’s economy coupled with overly high structural deficits and over 100 percent debt-to-GDP ratio. In 2012, Greece had the largest sovereign debt default in history and became the first developed country to fail to make an IMF €1.6 billion loan repayment on June 30, 2015. The government has a debt of €323bn.

daniel russell