Motion to remove me as finance minister 'weightless' – Ken Ofori-Atta

Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, has said he does not believe that the allegations made by the Minority in Parliament for his removal from office have any weight behind them.

Ken Ofori-Atta told the Adhoc Committee hearing the censure motion that the proponents' allegations do not have "weight for censure" describing them as false and further went on to debunk them.

On the allegation of deliberate misreporting of economic data to Parliament, the finance minister said it was completely not true.

“Since I took office in 2017, I have served the country with integrity and honesty. Under my leadership at the Ministry of Finance, there have been significant improvements in the accurate reporting of public finances."

He added that, “Today, under President Nana Akufo-Addo, Ghanaians are enjoying greater accountability and transparency in the management of the public purse than any other period under the Fourth Republic.”

He said since 2017, the government has complied with the reporting provisions in the Public Financial Management Act 2016 (Act 921), including Budget Implementation report, Fiscal Reports, Public Debt Report, Petroleum Revenue Management Reports, ESLA report, etc.

On the issue of not including the financial sector clean-up cost and the energy sector IPP payments in the deficit, the Finance Minister said contrary to the position of others, they were clearly stated.

“I want to emphasize, with the Budget document as evidence, that these payments were reflected in the fiscal framework. Energy sector IPP payments were treated as “amortisation” and the non-cash financial sector clean-up payments were reflected in the “memo item” (Refer to Appendix 2A of the Fiscal Tables in the relevant Annual Budget),” the minister said.

Meanwhile, in May 2020, Dr Albert Touna Mama, the former country representative of the IMF speaking on Joy FM's News File Programme said there was no misrepresentation of data by the government as was being alleged.

Dr Touna Mama said government was not the one that presented the figures that the IMF published in its statements.

He explained that the difference in figures was as a result of a difference in the methodology of calculation, adding that the figure in fiscal deficit in their statement was a figure they generated themselves from the data government presented to them, having added financial and energy sector payments in line with their methodology, which is different from government's methodology.