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Vice President Dr. Bawumia says President Akufo-Addo has kept
his promise of reducing the country’s rate of borrowing as compared to the
previous NDC administration.
Dr. Bawumia , speaking at a town hall meeting at
Kumasi in the Ashanti Region to account for the various campaign promises made
to the people of Ghana , said better economic management and fiscal discipline
has put the economy of Ghana on the right path.
Addressing issues of the country’s total debt
stock which has hit 214.9 billion as of November 2019, Dr. Bawumia explained
that during their three years in office the country’s debt stock increased by
79 percent as compared to the 247 percent from 2012 to 2016.
With his calculation, the debt stock which also
included the banking sector cleanup would have been at 203 billion cedis
without the banking sector cleanup cost.
Dr. Bawumia strongly attributed the success to a
positive primary balance and fiscal discipline in the economy.
“Let us look at what has happened to the
debt as a result of this fiscal discipline that we have imposed on yourselves
in achieving the positive primary balance. The total public debt has increased
from 122 billion Cedis in 2016 to 214.9 billion in 2019 that is 9.3 percent of
GDP at the end of November 2019, but this includes the cost of the banking
sector cleanup which you know is over 13 billion Cedis and counting, excluding
the cost of the banking sector cleanup the debt stock stands at 203 billion
cedis however if you look at these debt dynamics the strong physical adjustment
that has taken place and better debt management has meant that the rate of debt
accumulation has slowed down considerably to the lowest in a decade. Between
2008 and 2012 Ghana debt stock increase by 267%, between 2012 and 2016 Ghana
debt stock increase by another 247% but between 2017 and 2019 the increase has
been by 79 percent so there is a big difference.”
Dr Bawumia, therefore, believed that the NPP
government led by President Akufo-Addo has kept their promise to the Ghanaian
people to reduce the rate of borrowing.
“So you are seeing that there is a fiscal
discipline the is being implemented there is a big difference between before
2017 and after 2017, so the government of Akufo-Addo has therefore kept its
promise to reduce the rate of borrowing that was taking place before we came
into power..”
Ghana’s public debt stock hits GHS214.9bn
The country’s total debt stock has hit GH¢214.9
billion ending November 2019.
This was contained in the January 2020 Bank of
Ghana’s summary of financial and economic data released Friday.
This was released after the Monetary Policy
Committee met earlier this week to review the health of the economy and set a
new policy rate for the market, which currently stands at 16 percent. The rate
often influences the cost of credit in the country.
The GH¢214.9 billion total debt represents 62.1
percent of Ghana’s-Debt-to-GDP ratio ending November 2019.
The $20.3 billion (GH¢111.9 billion) of the debt
were borrowings done by the government in dollars and from outside the country
(that is the external debt component). This represents 32.4 percent of the country’s
GDP.
