News:
November 30, 2017
Minority spokesperson on Finance, Casiel Ato Forson has described the 2018 budget statement and government policy as empty and must be withdrawn since it has nothing good for the Ghanaians populace.
“This budget is empty. It must be rejected and withdrawn” he said.
He said the budget is a charade and does not address the unemployment needs of the country.
According to him section 28(2d) of Public Financial Management (PMF) Law requires Parliamentary approval before a mid-year budget is reviewed but the Finance Minister failed to adhere to that provision before reviewing the 2017 budget hence the 2018 budget must be rejected and withdrawn.
The Finance Minister he noted in his presentation of a revised budget outlook for the unexpired term of the financial year as prescribed by the law.
He was at a lost why the administrative cost of the government would increase from GHC 4 billion to GHC 6.7 with same happening to the Office of Government machinery jumping from GHC 31 million to GHC 1.56 billion over a one-year period.
Mr Ato Forson who is a former Deputy Finance Minister observed on the contrary that monies for the Food and agriculture, tourism, fisheries, roads and Highways ministries, areas which are critical to job creation, were rather on the decline.
He accused government of depleting some statutory funds to fund unrelated areas and challenged it to find ways to fund it’s flagship programmes and take hands-off the funds which are targeted at specific sectors of the economy.
By Christian Kpesese/ ghanamps.com