NPP-NDC refuses to think 'outside the box' – CPP
The 2010 budget presented to parliament was not without the usual NDC-NPP blame game. The sheer arrogance and disrespect for Ghanaians characterised this important event when the minister of Finance, Dr. Kwabena Duffuor continually compared arrears and problems left by the NDC1 administration in 2000, and that left by the NPP administration in 2008 rather than focusing on results achieved or inherited problems solved.
These unfortunate developments, particularly the indistinct economic policy agenda of the Mills led administration towards national development formed the basis of a press conference by the Convention Peoples Party addressed by it Chairman, Ladi Nylander.
According to Mr. Nylander, this persistence in trying to show which one has done worse things instead of who has accomplished more, gives additional cause for the CPP to worry about what the future brings to the ordinary Ghanaian.
“We wish to put on record that since 1993, the NDC and NPP have had the opportunity to clean-up government machinery and specifically expenditure management. Yet, the current Administration finds it necessary to highlight inability to detect significant arrears due to procurement of goods and services as a barrier to performance or solving problems. The fact quite simply is that judgment debts and arrears due to contractors have become facts of life under Administrations led by both political parties”.
The Ghanaian Journal Publish below unedited press statement
The Convention People's Party (CPP) wishes to express its views on the fiscal and economic policies of the current Administration as experienced by Ghanaians in 2009 and expressed in the 2010 budget presented to Parliament on Wednesday, November 18, 2009 by the Minister of Finance & Economic Planning.
On March 5, 2009, the governing Administration presented its 2009 budget to Parliament. The centre piece of the budget was reducing the estimated end of year 2008 budget deficit of 14.5% of GDP to 9.4% of GDP at the end of 2009. This was accompanied by a programme that can be described as having an economic stabilization objective.
The stabilization objective was confirmed by the Minister of Finance & Economic Planning when he said on March 5th that: “The policy thrust of the 2009 budget is to reduce the current budget deficit to sustainable levels, improve the exchange rate regime, and work towards the attainment of single digit inflation.”
We wish to point out that a stabilization objective is an antithesis of the NDC Party's own Social Democratic beliefs as spelt out in their 2008 Campaign Manifesto. It is also counter to the growth objectives set by the Rawlings-led NDC1 Administration that were embedded in Vision 2020.
The economics management conundrum that this hopeful Country has experienced since 1993 has taken its toll on the Ghanaian economy and has dampened the entrepreneurial spirit in many Ghanaians. In the CPP's 2008 Manifesto “New Dawn, New Vision”, we proposed to implement a series of medium-term plans to reflect both our Party's ideology of Nkrumaism and the Direct Principles of State Policy intervention which constitute a national vision agreed by all Ghanaians in the 1992 Constitution.
We promised to develop a long-term national development plan based on the national vision to be called Ghana@75: A Roadmap to High-income Status. This means necessarily that we would have focused principally on growth had we succeeded in winning the elections and forming a Government.
The important point to be made here is that the objectives set by this NDC Administration's Finance & Economic Planning Minister will be missed. No single digit inflation, no reduction of budget deficit to sustainable levels, no improvement in the foreign exchange regime. Furthermore, Government's revenue targets will be missed while cost of living has risen. On top of it all, fuel prices have risen drastically.
As a country, we have not done anything in 2009 to take advantage of the global financial crisis to strengthen our economy against future shocks. We have not done anything to use the inconsistency in the responses coming from the international free marketers to move our people to make sacrifices for a better future. We have been on a rocky road to the “Better Ghana” promised us by NDC in 2008.
It is prudent economic management practice to have a budget sit within a certain policy framework as a guide to implementation. Unfortunately the NDC Government is yet to come to grips with this basic principle. A CPP-led Administration would have based a good part of its 2009 budget on a policy framework of “bringing the economy back home” to Ghanaians, to encourage local enterprises and create jobs to ensure sustainable prosperity.
The fiscal 2009 budget demonstrates lack of the vigorous sense of urgency to creating the advantage to Ghanaians that a CPP-led Administration would have used from the very beginning of its tenure of office.
And herein, please allow me to give a very simple example. Whilst the CPP is at ease with the moves to encourage local rice production & consumption, we want to ask why we should just stop there. We are simply not going far enough; & this is very frustrating!! What about the Millions of dollars of an item like tomato puree which are imported into this Country annually? Have we, by the way, forgotten the legacy of the Pwalugu Tomato Facility which our Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah bequeathed to us? And, incidentally, could schemes like that be part of the solution to the rural urban migration drift that create those unfortunate “Sodoms & Gomorrahs” in the urban areas? What other such legacies are we consigning to the dustbins? Dear Ghanaians, there are very many of such, dotted around the Country since 1966, with their many related attendant & ancillary benefits. This is what the Convention People's Party expects. This is what a CPP Government would have been about. This is what a CPP Government will do in order to resolve the seemingly unsolvable problems that confront us. A multi-faceted & logical approach with advantageous knock-on effects!
The 2010 Budget – Fiscal & Economic Policies of Government
The Minister of Finance & Economic Planning was quite clear in setting the tone and direction from the very beginning of his address to Parliament that pointed to a “business as usual” policy orientation.
The NDC-NPP blame game continued through the repeated emphasis on comparing arrears and problems left by the NDC1 administration in 2000, and that left by the NPP administration in 2008 rather than focusing on results achieved or inherited problems solved. This persistence in trying to show which one has done worse things instead of who has accomplished more, gives additional cause for the CPP to worry about where the future will bring to the ordinary Ghanaian.
We wish to put on record that since 1993, the NDC and NPP have had the opportunity to clean-up government machinery and specifically expenditure management. Yet, the current Administration finds it necessary to highlight inability to detect significant arrears due to procurement of goods and services as a barrier to performance or solving problems. The fact quite simply is that judgment debts and arrears due to contractors have become facts of life under Administrations led by both political parties.
They refuse to think 'outside the box' & to gear themselves to shift to new paradigms! The end result is misery & drudgery!
The CPP policy alternative is a budget with fundamental focus on how Government is going to use its tremendous purchasing power to promote domestic control over the economy & to alleviate the plight of the poor.
Unfortunately, the 2010 budget continues the same old policy of achieving macroeconomic stability and fiscal consolidation at the expense of real growth that would encourage job creation and rise in the standard of living of Ghanaians.
The 2010 budget presented couple of days ago does not carry with it the gravitas & policy intentions that will make it easier for our local companies to gain easier access to credit, obtain lower cost funds and create more jobs in the country. We ask Ghanaians to examine carefully the fiscal policy presented by the current Administration with its priority spending areas as follows:
o Oil and Gas
o Modernization of Agriculture
o Private Sector Development
o Key Infrastructure Development
o Information and Technology Development
Nothing new or different was presented in Parliament that gives concrete expression to each one of these priority spending areas in terms of ability to deliver on targets set in the budget. It is quite apparent that priority and significant hope is being put by the Administration on Oil and Gas revenue to move the country to 8-10% GDP growth in the future in order to become a middle income earning country by 2020.
Nothing new was presented by the Minister of Finance to show how we will get there. Much was said about stabilization, expenditure controls and arrears payment – what made the economy stagnate in 2009 – but very little about growth. Given that the prospects are that this Administration will miss its 2009 GDP growth target of 5.9% with an actual of about 4.7%, it is difficult to determine how we will reach a growth target of 6.5% in 2010.
Finally, we note that the Administration is asking Ghanaians to be patient and continue to be understanding. It is asking Ghanaian labor to keep faith with Government. Through the Minister of Finance, the NDC government is raising the prospect of missing its 2010 targets by putting together potential risks of crude oil price increases and the discovery of new arrears.
The reality is that the NDC Government through Finance Minister Dr. Kwabena Duffuor is telling Ghanaians that the change we were promised – drastically improving the economic performance at the micro or human person level was just a promise. Nothing new was presented by the Minister to show that we are on course to achieve a “Better Ghana” in the four year tenure of this NDC Administration.
Thank you!
Ladi Nylander
CPP Party Chairman