Veteran Ghanaian journalist, Kwesi Pratt Jnr, has admonished the Nana Akufo-Addo led administration for doing the exact same things they incessantly reproved the previous administration for.
“The real government is IMF and World Bank. So we have to look at substance. Yes we want an elected Nana Akufo-Addo. Fine. Are you sure we elected him? I am not so sure. Because all the things he criticized in opposition, he is doing the same now,” he noted.
Among other things, the current NPP government after assumption into office has been criticized by many for the piling up of debt at a disturbing rate, a situation they had bemoaned prior to the 2016 general elections.
Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia before the elections, is on record to have suggested that the then government “appears to have over-estimated Ghana’s capacity to borrow by ignoring the fact that the re-basing of the economy statistically did not increase GDP.”
“The numbers look good, but it did not increase the cash flows. Over the last five years, the accelerated borrowing, the massive increase in debt has basically compromised Ghana’s oil discovery and the benefits that we could have gotten from it,” the vice president noted while insinuating that his administration would do things differently.
Years down the line, after a few loans, the Vice President then said borrowing was not bad if it is done responsibly.
“A lot of people misunderstand when we say that we are going to be responsible. It doesn’t mean we will not borrow money. No government can say they won’t borrow money, that is ridiculous, but you have to borrow responsibly and not recklessly and that is the way we are going to manage this economy,” he noted.
But speaking at a Public Forum on the US Military base in Ghana Monday June 4, Mr. Pratt explained that, the way the new administrations run to the IMF and the World Bank for financial aid only proves that the nation has always been governed by these organizations and has since 1992 not witnessed a change in government.
“Anybody you vote into office, they quickly run to Washington to go and look for the IMF and the World Bank to give them a plan. So you haven’t changed any government.
Every four years we are free to change our government. Is that not what we were told? So in 1992, we went for the first election. Ask yourself whether since 1992 there has been a change of government in Ghana. What has happened is that every four years we go and put papers in the ballot box, but the papers we put in the ballot box is not to change government. It is to change the face of the government. The truth is that since 1992, our real President and government has been the IMF and the World Bank. That has not changed,” he said.
