Lawyer and National communications team member of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Edudzi Tamakloe, has slammed the Bank of Ghana (BoG) for making losses of up to GH¢60.8 billion as a result of printing money for government to expend.

He stressed that government had no business scrapping the Nation Builders Corps (NABCO) programme for lack of funds and even owing beneficiaries of the programme when it had as much as GH¢60.8 billion to spend.

Mr Edudzi Tamakloe estimated that the losses of GH¢60.8 billion made in the financial year could pay all the NABCO trainees the monthly stipend of GH¢700 for sixty years.

Speaking on TV3’s New Day programme Monday, August 14, 2023, Mr Tamakloe stressed that the BoG’s action of printing money for Government to meet its expenditure needs – which had been hinted at much earlier by an NPP stalwart – was reckless and has bankrupted the bank.

“The losses made by the Bank of Ghana can pay NABCO trainees for sixty years. sixty years,” he pointed out on the programme.

The Bank of Ghana has explained that the losses incurred were as a result of the government’s Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP) as part of its debt restructuring in 2022 to achieve sustainable debt levels.

In 2018, at the launch of the NABCO programme, President Akufo-Addo noted that the programme was to tackle youth unemployment.

“NABCO will be the vehicle to deliver one hundred thousand (100,000) jobs in seven (7) prioritised areas, defined as the following modules: Educate Ghana; Heal Ghana; Feed Ghana; Revenue Ghana; Digitise Ghana; Enterprise Ghana; and Civic Ghana,” he said.

After three years, the programme was phased out with Government owing many of the beneficiaries their allowances.