DDEP: Foreign bondholders won’t make life easy for government – Yamson

Convener of Individual Bondholders, Michael Harry Yamson is predicting a tough time for the government when it starts meeting foreign bondholders for Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP).

The government after nearly two months of struggle completed the domestic debt exchange programme with many bondholders having to sacrifice their investments.

The Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, has declared that all pensioners who declined to submit their old bonds for new ones under the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP) have been exempted from the programme.

Briefing Parliamentarians on the state of the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme, in Parliament House on Thursday, February 16, 2023, Ken Ofori-Atta urged the pensioner bondholders, some of whom were in Parliament, not to be troubled as all their coupons will be honored when they mature.

Commenting on the development of State of Affairs on GHOne TV, Mr. Yamson advised the government to brace itself for tough times since foreign bonders will not be an easy walkover.

“The external bondholders come armed with lawyers, they come with legal protection. Today one of the clauses in the letter says that 85 percent has been achieved. It includes a very interesting point, some miraculously have their bonds converted into T-bills. So while pensioners were in the sun others got their bonds converted into treasury bills.

“I tell you foreign bondholders will not make life easy. The only thing that may save us in the long term is discipline, discipline in the executive when it comes to spending money. Parliament needs to be stronger in how it oversees the affairs of the executive because as for the external debt negotiation, it will be tough, make no mistake,” Mr. Yamson stated.