NPP's $1 million-one-constituency policy laudable but not feasible – Finance Lecturer

A Senior Lecturer of Finance at the University of Ghana Business School says although a pro-poor policy proposal for constituencies in Ghana by the oppostion New Patriotic Party (NPP) sounds good, it is not feasible.

Dr. Lord Mensah says the one million dollars which the NPP says it will allocate for all 275 constituencies to fight poverty is fancy at best.

According to him, financing the policy would prove a major challenge.

He cites the current revenue generation capacity of the country as the reason for his difficulty to believe the policy can be attainable.

He said the NPP risks losing the trust of electorates if it keeps making huge promises. He cautioned the party from being too optimistic since it was not in power to know the real challenges that it may face.

Dr. Lord Mensah was speaking Wednesday on Burning Issues on Adom FM, hosted by Afia Pokua.

The NPP recently added the one million dollars per constituency policy to its list of astounding campaign promises.

The party had earlier promised to build a dam in each of the thousands of villages in the country and also set up a factory in every region if it wins the December elections.

Commenting on the pro-poor policy, Dr. Mensah wondered whether the NPP will generate the money internally or seek funds from the international market.According to him borrowing from the international market is a nonstarter since the country is already saddled with huge debts.

Details of the policy is not clear, however, the party’s Vice Presidential candidate Dr Mahamudu Bawumia said the constituency fund would be set up with a 1.6 billion dollar from the capital expenditure budget.

"We are going to give every constituency one million dollars from the capital expenditure budget to spend on priority infrastructural projects as part of efforts to eradicate poverty," he said.

Dr. Mensah has cautioned the NPP to be measured in its optimism.