<<Print>>

Contrary to the Minister for Finance and Economic Planning, Dr Kwabena Dufuor and the National Democratic Congress government�s claim that the opposition New Patriotic Party messed up the economy, the Minority New Patriotic Party Caucus in Parliament has debunked that claim. Yesterday, the Minority led by its leader, Hon Osei Kyei-Mensah Bonsu took a swipe at the Minister of finance and Economic Planning, Dr Kwabena Duffuor for the lies he told Parliament when he presented the Mid-Year Review and Supplementary Budget to the honourable house on August 25th, 2009. They also called on Mr Duffuor who is a former Governor of Bank of Ghana to refrain from creating a bright picture of the economy to the IMF and World Bank, whilst creating a bleak picture to the good people of this country. Addressing a press conference yesterday, the Minority Leader, Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu said they were amazed about the lies being peddled by the National Democratic Congress government and stressed that the NPP government never messed up the economy. This assertion compelled him to compare and contract the records of the former NDC and NPP administration in 2000 and 2008 respectively. Setting the records straight, Hon. Kyei-Mensah Bonsu explained that in 2000, inflation stood at 41% under the NDC government as compared to 18% when the NPP exited office in 2008. He continued that in the year 2000 the cedi depreciated by 50% whilst in 2008, the cedi depreciated by 22%. Lending rates in 2000, he revealed were around 50%, whilst it dropped significantly to around 27% when the NPP left office. �When the NDC government left eager reserves of $236 million whilst the NPP government left reserves to the tune of $2,036 million, almost ten times that of the NDC government enough to provide import cover for nine weeks, whereas at the exit of the NDC import cover was for two weeks,� he noted. Flanked by his colleague Members of Parliament, the Minority Leader disclosed that the economy grew in real terms by only 3.7% in 2000 whilst in 2008 the economy grew at a faster rate of 7.3%%. By these statistics, he averred that the NPP never run down the economy as being portrayed by the Finance Minister and the NDC. Exposing what he described as hypocrisy in the NDC administration, Hon Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu accused the NDC of being economical with the truth and inconsistent about the state of the economy. He wondered why the Finance Minister had suddenly turned around to demonise the Kufuor administration to Ghanaians after presenting a brilliant picture about the same administration to the IMF and the World Bank. �In his letter to the MP, Dr Dufuor said �Real GDP growth increased steadily from 3.7 percent to 7.3 percent in 2008. This growth was fostered by significant debt relief which provided the country with fiscal space to embark on critical infrastructure investments, particularly in the energy and road sectors, as well as targeted social spending, all under the Ghana Poverty Reduction Strategy (GPRS). The combination of higher output declining inflation, and improved social spending under the GPRS framework contributed significantly to lower poverty levels. The national incidence of poverty declined from 39.5 percent in 1998/99 to 28.5 percent in 2005/2006. At this rate, Ghana is poised to achieve the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving extreme poverty ahead of 2015,� Osei Kyei disclosed. These he instead are not signs of a run down economy. He exposed the finance Minister for presenting different figures in March when the latter presented his maiden budget to Parliament. The Minority Leader also made it known that in the Health sector, the Finance Minister acknowledged progressive improvements in the delivery of a number of important outputs.