Don't privatise Ghana Broadcasting - SFG

The Socialist Forum of Ghana (SFG) has called on the government to reconsider privatising Ghana Commercial Bank Limited (GCB).

According to the Forum the privatisation of the GCB along with utility services like water and electricity in the name of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) as part of conditions for debt reduction would leave the country in a "more confused state than help the debt situation".

The Forum came out with the position at a discussion on the way out of Ghana's debt problem in Accra at the Weekend sponsored by The Insight newspaper. Professor Atta Britwum of the French Department of the University of Cape Coast, who led the discussion questioned the rationale for privatising utility services with foreign majority shareholdings.

He said " in America, a foreigner cannot go and buy the water system. Doing so would be holding the entire nation to a ransom." Professor Britwum said it was ironical for government to privatise companies giving majority holdings to foreigners and guaranteeing loans from development partners for them, adding, "such a situation leaves the country in a quandary and debt if the privatised companies do not perform".

He called for the revision of the country's development strategies and to relate production to distribution and consumption. Dr Raymond Osei, a lecturer at the Department of Classics and Philosophy of the University of Cape Coast said "the handing over of strategic local assets to foreigners as a result of lack of local capital would create foreign monopoly and affect negatively local industrial intelligence and skill development".

Mr Kwesi Pratt Jnr, Managing Editor of The Insight called on countries that gained economically from the slave trade to "calculate the cost of imperialism and re-write the balance sheets of the developed world and African countries" saying "the debt burden is a major fraud, it has no legitimacy".

He said the way out for Africa and the government was to "empower the people to take their destiny into their own hands to fight for their emancipation and that of the nation".