Ken Ofori-Atta has led Ghana’s economy 'into the gutter' - Kwame Pianim fumes

Renowned Economist, Kwame Pianim, has accused the Akufo-Addo-led administration of superintending over the current economic challenges with no probable solutions to address them.

He believes that the economic managers, particularly the Finance Minister [Ken Ofori-Atta], are responsible for Ghana’s predicament and therefore wants him to apologise for the mismanagement.

Speaking in an interview with Accra-based TV3, Kwame Pianim asserted that Ofori-Atta's irresponsibility and recklessness have led the country into a ditch, which now plans to undertake a debt restructuring exercise for an IMF bailout.

"...I would have been proud as a Ghanaian to contribute to the debt restructuring exercise but I will not contribute one pesewa for Ken Ofori-Atta leading this, he led us into the gutter..." he stressed.

Kwame Pianim further questioned the rationale behind President Akufo-Addo’s decision to maintain belief in the Finance Minister despite the economic challenges.

“He should have said I apologise, this is the result of economic mismanagement. I apologise to Ghanaian people, look there are pensioners who have put their resources into government bonds, you're asking them, I'm not going to pay, look at the exchange programme and think about it carefully when you are talking to your colleagues. Ken is saying, I'm not going to pay any interest on this for these years whiles I'm Minister of Finance and while President is still President but afterwards then you're going to take a look at it.”

The renowned economist added that should the president continue to keep Ofori-Atta in charge of the economy, his administration will simply go down.

“The IMF, three billion that they're going to give is, I want them to frontload it, so that I chop it before I go, is that genuine? Are you serious that this is genuine? If the President wants Ken Ofori-Atta to continue there, this government will go down with Ken Ofori-Atta”.

Touching on the appointment of Ofori-Atta as the caretaker minister of Trade and Industry, Kwame Pianim opined that the move was wrong on the part of the president.

“The first time Ken Ofori-Atta started, he said he was going to transform this economy from the Guggisberg economy to a new economy. He did not even understand what the Guggisberg economy was," Pianim said.

He continued, “In the Guggisberg economy, he had a plan for cocoa, distribute cocoa, built roads into the villages, where there was timber he built the roads, then he built railways, he built the ports, he built Achimota school, built Legon infrastructure, by the time we got independence we had plenty of reserves.

“So, Ken Ofori-Atta if the monies he borrowed, if he was running a Guggisberg economy, we could have seen that cash flow coming out from the monies he was borrowing so that we can be able to repay. All the time he was borrowing recklessly. At the back of his mind was that he was not going to pay,” he bemoaned.

MA/FNOQ