President Mahama: Ghana can't turn back now

Accra, Sept 04, GNA -President John Dramani Mahama on Tuesday enlisted the support of Ghanaians to consolidate the gains the country had so far made in her socio-economic and political development.

He observed that the nation was getting more united and stronger, and had come too far to turn back now.

President Mahama reiterated the commitment of the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) to ensure an effective completion of the agenda set by the Government of the late President John Evans Atta Mills, under who he served as Vice President

President Mahama made the appeal in a policy action statement of the Government for the rest of the year, to a cross section of the public, at the Accra International Conference Centre.

The statement, delivered on the traditional 40th day of the passing of the late President Mills reassured Ghanaians of President Mahama's commitment to invest in people, to build a strong economy, develop infrastructure and to ensure transparency and accountability in governance.

President Mahama said the surest way to immortalise the late President is for Ghanaians to recommit themselves to his agenda to create a Better Ghana for all.

President Mahama listed some of the priorities set for the final year of the first term as consolidating Government's achievements , holding down inflation and maintaining macro-economic stability; maintaining discipline in government expenditure so as to avoid unbudgeted expenditure that can distort the economy and effectively implementing the single spine salary structure for public services so that improved remuneration for our public servants can lead to increased productivity in their performance.

Others were stimulating growth in agriculture and industry with a view to generating jobs, especially for the youth of our country, accelerating infrastructure development, ensuring wise utilization, in a transparent manner, of oil revenues and revenues, ensuring proper governance of our other natural resources and ensuring local content as a cross-sectoral imperative.

President Mahama announced that a formal cooperative mechanism would be established in the next three weeks between the Ministry of Finance and the Bank of Ghana in order to strengthen the functions of the Economic Management Team.

He also directed renewed emphasis for support for the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) in implementing on-going tax office and process reforms which aims at broadening the tax base and its efficient collection.

The President has also directed completion by the MOFEP of the comprehensive database for all MDA contracts to improve the management of central government commitments as part of the on-going structural reform to establish an integrated budget and expenditure system called GIFMIS to improve preparation of the Budget and Public Accounts.

Further directive has been given for the completion of the inter-ministerial study of the formula for utility and fuel pricing to allow for judicious balance between cost recovery and profitability and subsidies for vulnerable groups.

President Mahama said the depreciation of the cedi in the early part of the year was as a result of combination of factors.

He explained that last year, the nation spent twice as much foreign exchange on non-oil imports as the year before, which put pressure on the nation's foreign reserves of foreign exchange with continued increase.

With the completion of the migration and payment of arrears under the Single Spine Pay Policy (SSPP) by the end of the year, the President said he had directed the Minister of Finance to recommend short and medium-term measures to restore the balance between government expenditures on personal emoluments, goods and services, and capital and infrastructure development that is consonant with our middle income status.

“These urgent actions are directives from the Office of the President. They will have verifiable outcomes which will be reported to my office on a monthly basis, “President Mahama said.

GNA