Cedi gains: You can’t say it’s all NPP’s doing – Prof. Bokpin

Economist Professor Godfred Bokpin has challenged assertions that the recent stability of the Ghanaian cedi is solely the result of policies implemented by the former New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration under Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia.

Instead, he credited the current government's economic coordination and strategic efforts as contributing factors.

During an interview on Morning Starr with Naa Dedei Tettey, Professor Bokpin acknowledged the role of past initiatives but stressed that the National Democratic Congress (NDC) administration cannot be dismissed in the conversation around the cedi’s performance.

“I do not subscribe to the proposition that this government has not done anything……..I’ve just explained to you from the fiscal side, I’ve explained to you from the monetary side, and the coordination that is going on. There’s a direction, there’s a focus where they are heading towards, they themselves are not surprised, so we cannot say they have not done anything,” he stated.

His remarks come in response to comments by Dr. Bawumia during a UK engagement with the Young Executive Forum, where the former Vice President credited the current strength of the cedi to NPP-era policies such as the gold reserves programme. He suggested the NDC government had made minimal contributions to the currency’s stability.

However, Professor Bokpin maintained that it is too early to discount the impact of the current administration’s work, particularly as several of their announced policies are still in early stages of execution.

“But in terms of transformative interventions and all of that, we can, yes, we haven’t seen that now, it’s early-stage days. I told you that real expenditure commitment to that government policy announcement, to launching and commissioning, is yet to happen, so we can say it from that perspective. But you can’t say that all of these are just down to what the previous administration did,” he argued.

He also pointed to improved synergy between key institutions as a factor helping to stabilize the economy, contrasting it with what he described as a lack of coordination during the previous regime.

“There’s some kind of intentionality from the fiscal side from the Minister of Finance, Bank of Ghana, and they have the strong backing of the President; they are mirroring the leadership of the President. Unlike what happened under the previous administration, there wasn’t much coordination between the Central government and the Bank of Ghana,” Professor Bokpin concluded.