The Minister of Finance on November 15, 2023, appeared before Parliament to read the budget ahead of the 2024 fiscal year.

The budget aimed to restore investor confidence and government's compliance with the IMF conditions over measures to restore economic growth and reduce inflation.

However, experts and other spokespersons were contacted by various news bodies to help defend and break down the budget for the citizens to understand and appreciate it.

One such personality was the Deputy Minister of Finance, Abena Osei-Asare who was contacted by Peace FM to appear on the Kokrookoo morning show with Kwami Sefa Kayi on November 16.

However, according to the production team, the deputy minister allegedly showed up but begged leave to attend the funeral of the late First Lady, Theresa Kufuor which was held at the State House at the time.

This development, however, did not go down well with the panellists of the show who chastised her for choosing a funeral rather than defending the budget.

Revealing this on the morning of the show, Kwami Sefa Kyei disclosed that the minister was told to be at the studios at 9 am but begged to arrive at 9:30. She arrived at 9:20 am and begged to leave to attend the funeral as she would not get the time to visit the former president’s family.

“I’ve been informed that the Deputy Finance Minister, Abena Osei Asare was supposed to join us, but due to some reasons, she wasn’t able to,” he said. “In fact, we gave her 9 am, so that she come on air at 9:30, but she came at 9:20 and asked to leave,” he added.

Atik Mohammed, who fumed at the news that the deputy minister would not be partaking in the discussions said " It is your responsibility to defend and explain the budget you presented to Ghanaians. We have paid you to do that and you rather choose to attend a funeral. We pay you to do your job. And this is part of your job.

“On such a huge platform like this, there is no government representative here. It is such a shame,” he fumed.

ID/EK