IMF: NPP government performs recklessly under no supervision - MP

The Member of Parliament for Dormaa West under the ticket of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Vincent Oppong Asamoah has opined that NPP-Government performs abysmally when they are not under any financial supervision. According to him, when they took over in 2017, the NPP-government, especially the Finance Minister, performed better because the country was under the IMF Programme, which had representatives residing in the country to monitor all economic activities. Unfortunately, when Ghana exited the IMF programme, he said the Finance Minister lost track, therefore putting Ghana at its current economic situation. His comments come following the call from 80 Members of Parliament demanding the removal of the Finance Minister. Some members of the Majority Caucus in Parliament have called for the dismissal of the Finance Minister, Mr. Ken Ofori Atta, with immediate effect. The majority group, led by the Member of Parliament for Asante Akim- North, Andy Appiah Kubi, demanded the removal of the Finance Minister from office at a press conference in Parliament Yesterday. According to them, the decision is based on issues of lack of confidence and non-performance on the part of Minister Ofori Atta. Aside from the Finance Minister, the NPP MPs have also called for the removal of the Minister of State at the Finance Ministry, Dr Charles Adu Boahen. Read Also: Allow Ofori-Atta to finish IMF negotiations – Akufo-Addo begs NPP MPs Speaking on Atinka TV’s morning show, Ghana Nie with Ekourba Gyasi Simpremu, Mr Vincent Oppong Asamoah was of the view that the Finance Minister should have resigned or been sacked by the President long ago. You may recall that the President commended the Finance Minister for performing very well before the covid-19 pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war, saying he will not blame him for the current economic turmoil. The MP said, ” Before 2017, the IMF and the World Bank predicted that Ghana’s growth rate would be 7 percent because of the investments made by the previous government.” Before the NDC left, we had solved ‘dumsor’. The major problem the Mahama-Administration had was the energy crisis. But by the time we left, we had been able to fix the energy issue, and we had additional oil fields. The IMF predicted that our growth rate would go to seven percent in 2017. At that time, we were working with the IMF and they were in this country, monitoring everything, even with the disbursement, everyone knows that they were giving Ghana GHC850 million under the IMF Programme, they disbursed only GHC300 Million and they disbursed the greater part when the NPP-government, and the Finance Minister took over.