Dr Mahmud Bawumia, the much touted financial whiz kid and economic guru of the NPP, has come under intense scrutiny since his ‘state of the Ghanaian economy’ lecture last week at the College of Physicians and Surgeons in Accra where this year’s Ferdinand Ayim Memorial Lectures were held. One of such critical observations of the NPP flagbearer running mate that caught the attention of The Catalyst was made by Deputy Minister of Finance, Mr Franklin Fiavi Fifi Kwetey over the weekend.
Mr. Fifi Kwetey did not just leave the NPP economic guru ‘riddled with bullets,’ but ripped him open as he exposed his intellectual dishonesty, the shallowness of his arguments and apparent lack of knowledge about the true state of the Ghanaian economy presently.
The deputy finance minister took a critical look at the NPP number two man of the moment- how honest, factual, credible and knowledgeable he is as far as economics is concerned vis-à-vis his pronouncements on the Ghanaian economy in his lecture, which was heavily attended by members of the NPP fraternity.
Mr. Kwetey pointed out that Dr Bawumia engaged in double talk regarding the Ghana Statistical Service. He said on one hand, the NPP running mate relied on figures churned out by the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) in praising the past NPP government for attaining middle income status for Ghana, but on the other hand, has cast doubts on the credibility of the GSS, which is still manned by the same people, regarding the single digit inflation figures recorded under the national Democratic Congress (NDC) government for about 24 months.
Making reference to a paper authored by Dr Bawumia whilst he was the deputy governor of the Bank of Ghana (BoG) Mr. Kwetey said Dr Bawumia stated at the time that it takes about six months for a movement in the depreciation of the cedi to affect inflation. He said the depreciation of the cedi that Dr Bawumia is making hue and cry about only began in January 2012 and has lasted less than six months so far.
Taking a look at how factual Dr Bawumia could be, Mr Kwetey said the NPP running mate and economic guru’s claim that the Single Spine Salary Structure (SSS) is an achievement of the NPP is completely false. He said there is not a single memo to support Dr. Bawumia’s claim. According to him, then President Kufuor on the eve of his departure after NPP lost the election made a simple announcement about SSSS, which he failed to implement in 8 long years.
Mr Kwetey also said the claim by Dr Bawumia that the NPP established Universities is not factual. He asked were the universities were.
Dr. Bawumia further claimed in his lecture that the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) and the LEAP initiative were NPP innovations. But the deputy finance minister said these are World Bank initiatives.
Mr. Kwetey also described Dr. Bawumia’s claim that interest rates were at their all-time high and that was affecting business badly as factually inaccurate. He noted that banks all over the country have reduced their base rates since the NDC took over political power from the NPP. He cited for example that Barclays Bank had its base rate hovering around 29% in 2009 but that has reduced to the current level of 16 %. He said all the other banks in the country have reduced drastically their base rates from the high levels that pertained under the NPP government.
The deputy finance minister also debunked the claim by Dr Bawumia that banks have had to merge in order to raise capital to be able to do business and wondered whether this was the man who was supposed to be in charge of regulation of banks in Ghana.
Mr Kwetey again shredded Dr. Bawumia’s claim that the reason why the NPP government was unable to maintain its April - May 2006 single digit inflation record was as a result of the global crisis. The deputy minister said the global crisis happened in 2008 and not 2006, and asked the NPP economic guru to come again.
In responding to Dr Bawumia on his claim that the NPP inherited a ‘tico economy’ and handed a ‘metro mass bus economy’ to the Mills-led NDC government, Mr. Kwetey said the NPP government, under Dr. Bawumia as deputy governor of BoG, left the economy in intensive care unit with the cedi in freefall, adding that not even the sale of Ghana Telecom was enough to bail them out, and that it took the Mills government 6 months to halt the decline after taking over power. He said the NPP left GHc38 billion cedis in arrears for the NDC government to pay. He said the NPP brought Ghana Commercial Bank on the brink of collapse after having depleted the reserves of the country.
Mr. Kwetey wondered why Dr Bawumia deliberately distorted the facts in his presentation by using old cedis in quoting figures for the NDC but used the new Ghana cedi in quoting similar figures for the NPP in comparing the performance of GDP, for instance, under both governments.
He also wondered why Dr. Bawumia would consider investments under the NDC government as debts. According to him, Dr Bawumia the economic guru should have known that investments in the infrastructure for example could not have been viewed only as a liability but an asset.
Touching on Ghana’s debt sustainability, Mr Kwetey said it was a tragedy that NPP’s economic guru did not know that Ghana’s debt profile currently is nowhere near unsustainable limits.
He again questioned Dr. Bawumia’s knowledge on the computation of inflation. This is because the NPP economic guru has computed his own rate of inflation using the prices of only six commodities, which is the basis of his attack on the GSS.
According to Mr. Kwetey, if this is the economic guru and saviour the NPP claims they have found to partner Nana Akufo-Addo for Ghana’s economic salvation, then God save Ghana.