Minority NDC says 2017 budget is deceptive
Describing the Government’s 2017 Budget statement as deceptive, the Minority National Democratic Congress (NDC) caucus in Parliament on Friday assured Ghanaians of holding the Government accountable in order not to disappoint Ghanaians.
The NDC parliamentarians said there were policy contradictions in the 2017 Budget Statement and described the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Government as that of ‘family, friends and financiers,’ saying it is trying to establish hegemony in Ghana.
Addressing a press conference at Parliament House in Accra, the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu, said the NDC caucus would be watching “closely from a vantage point of a responsible party.”
The press conference was to react to the 2017 Budget Statement presented to the House by the Finance Minister, Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, on Thursday, March 2, 2017.
The Minority called the budget statement a “419 Budget” and promised to highlight more of its views during next week’s debate on the budget.
Citing the international news outlet Bloomberg, Mr Iddrisu said the Ghana currency, the Ghana cedi, “is the worst performing currency in the world at the moment, having slumped by six per cent in the first month of the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia Government.”
He wondered why the 2017 Budget Statement was not specific or failed to address a number of issues despite a promise by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, in the State of the Nation Address, to address details of how to deliver on promises made during the electioneering.
These include the absolute free senior high school for continuing students rather than fresh entrants next September, payment of all contractors owed within the 100 days of the Akufo-Addo Government, ending April 17, 2017; and the “One Dam, One Village,” in the over 6,000 villages in the Northern, Upper East and Upper West regions.
Others are the restoration and payment of nursing and teacher trainee allowances estimated at about GHC 637.2 million per annum for the 2017 fiscal year without compromising gains made in increasing enrolment; and the provision of $237 million for disbursement to all 275 constituencies for the 2017 fiscal year.
Mr Iddrisu said the budget statement failed to address promises to pay swindled customers of DKM, ‘God is Love’ Bunco banks, and the provision of employment for the teeming unemployed youth of Ghana among others.
He said the promise on the reduction of electricity tariffs and transport fares through the removal of Energy Sector Levy, reduction of Corporate Tax from 25 to 20 per cent and three per cent Special Import Levy were all absent in the statement.
On macroeconomic stability, the NDC Caucus noted that a review of the macroeconomic outturn for 2016 revealed significant gains made by the previous NDC Government under President Mahama.
“To that end, we want to state emphatically that the rate of 13.3 per cent recorded in January 2017 is technical and has nothing to do with any policy initiative of the NPP Government,” Mr Iddrisu said.
He called on the Akufo-Addo Bawumia Government to, as matter of urgency, and in the national interest, take immediate steps to halt “the worrying decline of the Ghana cedi.
He said most of the macroeconomic targets set by the Government were in tandem with and represented a continuation of the work began by the immediate past NDC Administration.
The Minority Leader urged the Government to come clear with more information on proposed sale of state assets, first announced by President Akufo-Addo and later by the Finance Minster, to raise GH¢1.8 billion from the divestiture of some state assets.
Source: GNA