2014 Budget Is Unrealistic - Political Parties

Some political parties in the country have criticized the 2014 budget describing it as unrealistic. The Finance Minister, Mr. Seth Terkper on Tuesday presented the 72 page budget on the floor of the house of Parliament admits protest from the minority bench. At the end, the minority leader, Hon. Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu referred to the budget as �Uninspiring.� Some Financial Analysts, Organized Labour and civil organizations have expressed their misgivings on the budget. The Peoples National Congress (PNC) General Secretary, Bernard Mornah described it as unprogressive. �Clearly what we see is that the budget is not progressive enough in many ways; if you take agriculture which is the mainstay of our nation the budget only talked about cocoa as the only cash crop without diversifying the cash crop sector of this country.� He offered useful suggestions, �The shea industry could be expanded, and the groundnut sector could be expanded and be given the same stimulus as given to cocoa farmers; in particular the budget did not give an indication as to how we will be able to open the food deficit that we have and if you take the Ghana living standard survey it is clear that 60% to 80% of the Ghanaian spend his income on food and that is why we think the budget is not progressive enough.� Mr. Mornah however hailed the pay cuts in the salaries of members of the executive as announced by the Finance Minister. Deputy National Communications Director of the National Democratic Party (NDP), Ernest Owusu Bempah also described the budget as one of government�s PR gimmicks. �I describe the whole budget as intellectual lies because it is something that is absolutely not there that they can never achieve whatever they are talking about; just mere gimmicks and political rhetorics that they have been telling Ghanaians.� He lambasted government for �exceedingly� borrowing so much money, whereas hardships have been inflicted on Ghanaians.� According to Owusu Bempah, government has nothing new to offer Ghanaians and therefore inspired the citizens to demand accountability for the utilization of the nation�s resources. On his part, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) General Secretary, Mr. Kwadwo Owusu Afriyie described the 2014 budget as a visionless one. �We are highly disappointed in the budget that was presented indeed a budget that will lead to nowhere.� He said it was a rehash of the 2013 budget, �If you look at the 2013 budget the promises that were made of building schools and roads are the very things that have been repeated in the 2014 budget.� Mr. Afriyie felt government could have done better listening to and implementing some of the suggestions that were offered by the opposition parties after the 2013 budget. Also, the General and Agricultural Workers Union (GAWU) said government�s claim of achieving significant gains in the agric sector was not satisfactory. Deputy Secretary of GAWU, Edward Kareweh advised government to commit enough resources to boost the agric sector.