IMF bailout: Improve domestic revenue generation - CLOGSAG to gov't

The Civil and Local Government Staff Association (CLOGSAG) has asked government to improve on domestics revenue generation as way of dealing with the difficulties facing the economy.

Executive Secretary of CLOGSAG, Mr Isaac Bampoe Addo said the government will continue to have problems if it does not scale up revenue mobilisation domestically.

Speaking in interview with on the decision by the government to go to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for support, he said “Of course they are going to put in some conditionalities but the bottom line is this, once you are having issues with your internal revenue generation , once you don’t improve that, we will always have these problems.

“So, what we will say is that we need to improve our internal revenue generation and that is going to take us out of this because once you are not getting the internal generated revenue then you have these problems. so to come out with polices to improve our revenue generation.”

Mr Bampoe Addo further said association supports the decision by the government to go to the Fund.

In his view, this will not be the first time Ghana will be seeking assistance from the IMF.

“In the first place, we are civil servants, we are supposed to support government policies. We want to say that we support the policy to go back to the IMF.

“This is not the first time we are going to the IMF. We know the terrain, so it is no issue, we know how to survive it, we know how to get out of it so we don't see any problem with it. There is nothing wrong with it, we have been there before and we got out so this one too we will get out,” he said.

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has instructed his Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta to commence formal engagements with the IMF inviting the Fund to support an economic programme put together by the Government of Ghana.

This followed a telephone conversation between the President and the IMF Managing Director, Miss Kristalina Georgieva, conveying Ghana's decision to engage with the Fund.

The Ministry of Information announced this in a statement on Friday July 1.

—3news.com