Known for his candor and nerves, Member of Parliament for Assin Central, Kennedy Agyapong has once again emerged with ‘hard words’, this time, describing his party, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) as one which intellectualizes basically everything and practicalises very little.
Mr. Agyapong condemned his party members for ignoring mistakes of the past and wallowing blindly on the same paths that cost them years back.
“What we are telling the NPP is that, the English is a lot; Are we mad? Are we sick? Don’t we also have competent people to work for us? NPP we don’t learn, we don’t learn because under president Kufuor’s administration, he did marvelously well for this county, but incurred the wrath of the party people, apathy set in, they failed to vote.
The same thing is happening, I will say it because I panic when I hear some of the things and myself, I see what goes on because I am a businessman”, he said.
“It is my party but the way we want to make the money, it will affect us….NPP members, mostly, we are theorists, we are not practical, we don’t go to the ground and listen to what the ordinary people are saying”, he said on Adom TV’s ‘Badwam’Show Tuesday.
His statements came on the back of recent caution statements from the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER) on external borrowing and its impact on its revenue targets.
ISSER stated that government had borrowed about GHS50billion over the past years, including bailout loans, adding that, if the situation is not checked, it would lead to high-interest payments which would affect the fiscal space left for capital spending.
Professor Peter Quartey, the Head of Economics Division, ISSER at a press briefing in Accra on the 2019 budget, said the real Gross Domestic Product growth as at September 2018 was below target although December 2018 estimates may show a higher growth rate.
He said fiscal deficit based on both rebased and non-rebased were within target even though the revenue targets were missed.
Prof Quartey said the exchange rate depreciation for September 2018 was 7.5 per cent compared to 4.5 per cent rate of depreciation against the dollar recorded in 2017, adding that the situation had serious implication on import duties, the cost of doing business as well as the general cost of living.
