A Deputy Minister for Finance, Cassiel Ato Forson , has said he is willing to debate the running mate to the flag bearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr Mahamudu Bawumia on economics.
According to him, on a daily basis he is invited by the media to comment on issues raised by Dr Bawumia with respect to the management of the economy of this country.
He claimed that the issues he is invited to comment on are factually inaccurate issues deliberately raised by the running mate to the NPP flag bearer to make the government unpopular but for purposes of clarity and setting the records straight he accepts to speak on the issues in the media.
Dr Bawumia who has taken on President John Dramani Mahama about the state of Ghana’s public debt, has called on the president to give a proper briefing on the true state of borrowing that has occurred in the last seven years under the National Democratic Congress administration.
He told students of the Jasikan College of Education in the Volta region on Tuesday that within the last seven years alone under the NDC government Ghana’s total debt ballooned from the GH c 9.5 billion left behind by the Kufour-led administration to a projected GH c 99 billion by the end of 2015.
“What is clear is that 90% (i.e GH c 89.5 billion) of Ghana’s total debt since independence has been accumulated under this NDC government between 2009 and 2015,” he told the students.
Reacting to this claim by Dr Bawumia, on TOP FM’s morning show “YƐn NsƐmpa” hosted by Ekourba Gyasi on Wednesday, Cassiel Ato Forson who is also the Member of Parliament for Ajumako-Enyan-Esiam constituency in the Central region, said he is shocked at the way Dr Bawumia has consistently misled a section of Ghanaians with his inaccurate financial and economic analyses.
He said simple arithmetic and calculations done by first year economic students at the university will expose the flaws and inaccuracies in the submissions of Dr Bawumia hence, his willingness to debate Dr Bawumia if the opportunity presents itself in order to allow the people of this country to choose the better option.
Ato Forson who is an accountant by profession and holds a BSc (Accounting) from South Bank University, London, UK, challenged Dr Bawumia who also took a First Class Honours Degree in Economics at Buckingham University in 1987 and is also a former deputy governor at the Bank of Ghana, to produce the source of his figures.
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