Category: General

Minister for Finance Ken Ofori Atta said in his view the Speaker of Parliament Rt. Hon Alban Kingsford Sumana put the question on the 2024 budget and in his view the budget has been passed.

He further noted that there was a challenge which has not been resolved and it can be seen clearly when the video clips are recalled that the Speaker said the ‘I’s have it and “I believe we have a 2024 budget”, he told the media on Wednesday, November 29, 2023.

His statement followed a confusion that erupted on the floor of the House when the Minority challenged the Speaker’s ruling on the budget and compelled the Speaker to order for a headcount. The Majority would later stage a walkout in protest of the decision.

In an interview with members of the Parliamentary Press Corps, the Finance Minister noted that the Minority Leader and Majority Leaders concluded their debate and he came in with his concluding remarks.

“At the end of the day the Speaker put it to vote twice and declared that he thinks that the I’s have it; that means the budget in my view has been passed later there was a challenge which has not been resolved. As far as I know and I believe we have the 2024 budget passed until such time that they resolve whatever they want to resolve”.

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The Speaker of Ghana’s Parliament, Rt. Hon Alban Kingsford Sumana Bagbin has hinted that the House will pass the revised standing orders for implementation early next year before it goes on Christmas break.

According to him when this happens seatings of the Committees would be opened to the media and the public and this would happen in the first meeting of the four session of the eight parliament of the fourth Republic.

Again, more structures have been put in place by the Parliamentary service; “we have new organogram; the public affairs department has been restructured, we have Media Relations, Public engagement and working on broadcasting to telecast parliament live.“

This would help us operate a more transparent in a visible way, a more advocacy tool in our disposal, so that Ghanaians and voters would appreciate us better.

In addition July this year I inaugurate a citizen Bureau. This is to address challenges faced by civil society in their dealing with us; it will serve as one stop shop for information. It has been a point of contact for most civil society in obtaining information from Parliament, he explained.

He made this remarks at a Speaker’s breakfast forum organized in Accra on the theme, “thirty years of parliamentary democracy under the fourth republic: Reflections on citizens engagement and the way forward.

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In a landmark move aimed at achieving fiscal consolidation, macro-economic stability, and robust growth, Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta presented the government’s 2024 Budget, aptly named ‘Nkunim’ (victory), to Parliament last Wednesday. The comprehensive fiscal plan outlines a series of strategic measures intended to provide relief to the private sector and uplift the nation amid expenditure pressures.

During the budget presentation, Minister Ofori-Atta highlighted key initiatives designed to cushion the citizenry and stimulate economic vitality. The diverse range of measures spans from supporting local industries to promoting sustainable transportation solutions. Below is the complete list of initiatives unveiled in the ‘Nkunim’ Budget:

1. Extension of Zero VAT on Locally Manufactured African Prints:
   • The government has committed to extending the zero rate of Value Added Tax (VAT) on locally manufactured African prints for an additional two years. This move aims to bolster the local textile industry.
2. Waiver of Import Duties on Electric Vehicles for Public Transportation:
   • Import duties on electric vehicles designated for public transportation will be waived for a substantial period of eight years, encouraging the adoption of eco-friendly transport alternatives.
3. Import Duty Waivers on Semi-Knocked Down and Completely Knocked Down Electric Vehicles:
   • Registered Electric Vehicle (EV) assembly companies in Ghana will benefit from an eight-year waiver on import duties for semi-knocked down and completely knocked down electric vehicles. This initiative seeks to promote local EV assembly.
4. Extension of Zero VAT on Locally Assembled Vehicles:
   • The zero rate of VAT on locally assembled vehicles will be extended for an additional two years, providing continued support to the local automotive industry.
5. Zero VAT on Locally Produced Sanitary Pads:
   • A significant measure to enhance accessibility, VAT will be eliminated on sanitary pads manufactured within the country, ensuring affordability for consumers.
6. Import Duty Waivers for Raw Materials for Local Sanitary Pad Manufacturing:
   • Raw material import duties for the local manufacture of sanitary pads will be waived, reducing production costs and supporting the domestic production of essential hygiene products.
7. Exemptions on Importation of Agricultural Machinery, Medical Consumables, and Pharmaceutical Raw Materials:
   • Import duties will be exempted for crucial items such as agricultural machinery, medical consumables, and raw materials for the pharmaceutical industry, contributing to growth in these sectors.
8. Introduction of a 5% VAT Flat Rate on Commercial Properties:
   • To streamline administration and potentially reduce the tax burden on businesses, a new 5% VAT flat rate will replace the existing 15% standard VAT rate on all commercial properties.

The unveiling of the ‘Nkunim’ Budget reflects the government’s commitment to fostering economic resilience, supporting local industries, and ensuring sustainable development for the benefit of the citizenry.

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Minority Leader of Ghana’s Parliament Dr. Atto Forson has underscored the important of parliamentary oversight as one of its key functions.

At the opening of the 2024 post budget workshop organized for the second time in Parliament House, he said the workshop offers opportunity for Members of Parliament to understand the policy under pining the budget and its implications with the medium-term expenditure framework of government.

He noted that Article 103 and clause 3 of the 1992 constitution enjoins Parliamentary Committees to investigate and enquire into activities of ministries, departments and agencies for budgetary approval process and the allocation to Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) for the execution of their programmes for effective exercise of oversight of the Executive is particularly compelling this year for a number of reasons.

On the economy, the Minority leader was not pleased that the public including expects continue to blame parliament as a whole for government’s spending which put the economy under life support, notwithstanding the fact that the minority has consistently warned that the growing debt is unsustainable.

“Our economy is under life support and parliament has not been exempted from the blame by the public and expects, the public has argued that government spending, much has been blessed by parliament and that all the borrowing and spending by government were approved by parliament notwithstanding the fact that the minority has consistently warned that the growing debt is unsustainable”.

He asserts that 2024 is an election year, and its often the case no one needs to be reminded, the fiscal discipline is often placed at the back burner; the quest for electoral fortunes, over spending is the order of the day during election years to satisfy not planned campaign promises, projects that are hurriedly commenced most often without, dedicated funding sources; organized labour is assured of improved condition of service without regard with the impact wage bills.

This budget, he said would be the last and final budget to be presented for and on behalf of the president Nana Akufo-Addo, and the temptation to honor some of government promises irrespective of the consequence on the Ghanaian economy is very high.

This budget is the first since the government signed onto the IMF Programme and comes with strict conditionalities that would burden and bring hardship to Ghanaians, hence with all these we as MPs we need to scrutinize the budget and ensure government spend within the allowed fiscal space.

Dr. Forson thus called on MPs to support the country and have a critical look into the budget even the smallest potion, particularly the table and appendixes and make sure that all the allocations are prudent and good for purpose.

This year’s workshop will be an improvement over the previous years and should reflect some of the contributions that they would make on the floor. “I am confident that MPs would do justice to the debate”.

“Colleagues Ghanaians are watching us we need to increase our oversight responsibilities, we need to look at this budget and explain to Ghanaians that we care about them; the hardship they are going through.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

Parliament on Friday, November 17,2023   approved a $800 million cocoa syndicated loan for the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) to purchase cocoa from farmers.

The approved loan will be used to purchase about 47 percent of the projected 850,000 tonnes of cocoa beans from farmers through the Licensed Buying Companies for the 2023/2024 cocoa season.

The Minority Leader in Parliament, Dr. Cassiel Ato Forson noted that his side would have voted against the cocoa syndicated loan, if not for the pain it would have caused cocoa farmers.

This, he said is because of the tendency for COCOBOD to go into negative equity if aggressive measures are not taken to rein in the institution.

Dr Forson explained that “the matter is so severe that the IMF had a reason to report in the official document that went to the IMF Board that, the government must immediately prepare a policy document to turn around COCOBOD.”

“The truth is that this loan as I sit here, I am approving it largely because of the farmers other than that, this is a matter that we should have rejected. We should have rejected it and get COCOBOD to do some due diligence in the way they are managing the affairs of COCOBOD,” he said.

Ghanamps.com

Government hd budgeted in the 2024 budget statement and Economic Policy an amount of GH¢220 million to support the relief phase for the communities affected by the Akosombo Dam spillage as well as floods upstream in the Oti, Savannah, and Bono-East Regions.

For the restoration phase, Government through the Ministry of Agriculture will allocate additional resources to support the restoration of livelihoods.

In addition, the Ministry of Finance, through the government has requested funding from the World Bank under the IDA Crisis Response Window (CRW) to support the resettlement of the victims, restoration of livelihoods, compensation and reconstruction of infrastructure in the affected communities.

“Mr. Speaker, we recognise the place of climate policy and financing to help address the long-term effects of climate change on victims of drought, flooding, and other adverse weather events. Accordingly, the Ministry has applied to the Global Shield Against Climate Risk Fund, an initiative launched by President Nana Akufo-Addo and Chancellor Olaf Scholz during the COP 27 in Sham ElSheikh, to access some financial resources to support communities upstream and downstream of the Akosombo Dam.

I convey the sincere appreciation of H.E. The President and the entire Government to all groups and individuals who have empathized with, and supported the affected families. It is in this same spirit that we must continue to be grateful to God that no lives have been lost due to the devastating spillage from the Akosombo Dam.”

Government through VRA, NADMO, and various agencies under the 13-member high level inter-ministerial committee, (comprising of the Ministries of Energy, Finance, Local Government, Environment, Interior, Health, Sanitation & Water Resources, Defense, Roads & Highways, Education, Information, Health, and Gender) have subsequently provided various forms of support to the impacted communities.

This support included food and related items, drinks, mattresses, mosquito nets and coils, clothes, baby food and diapers, sanitary pads, treated water services and storage tanks, solar lamps, sanitation services, restoration of utility services, and some social infrastructure.

“Mr. Speaker, the visit of the officials of the Ministry of Finance and myself, in collaboration with VRA, to the victims of the Akosombo Dam Spillage in Mepe was truly revealing and sobering. Indeed, we empathize with the families that have been affected and displaced by the spillage. We met victims, townsfolks, children, the chiefs and of course Honourable Okudzet, he added.

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Presenting the 2024 budget on the floor of the House on Wednesday, November 15, 2023 Finance Minister Ken Ofori Atta noted two years out of the seven years that the current New Patriotic Party has been in power the Ghanaian economy faced challenges.

The economy, growing at an average of 7 percent with a single-digit inflation, declining interest rates and a stabilising currency, suffered unforeseen shocks like many other economies.

GDP growth slumped from 6.5 percent in 2019 to 0.5 percent in 2020 – as the lockdown and closure of businesses and the ports had a devastating effect on the economy, triggering a cost-of-living crises that has made lives difficult for the Ghanaian people.

Though bartered and bruised, we are not broken and our resilience is manifesting and we also saw the damaging effects that the economic downturn had on Ghana’s already stretched revenues.

This was even made worse by the additional expenditures that were required during the covid-19 Pandemic to ensure that life and livelihoods were protected, he said.

Mr. Speaker, 2020 was also in an election year. The first ever election in the Fourth Republic with zero donor funding.

However, Government’s sensitivity to our people was remarkable: No lay-offs in the public service; salaries were dutifully paid over the year; and free water and electricity for the entire population was provided, especially for life-line consumers.

Indeed, Entrepreneurship was not ignored as GH¢600 million of CAPBuSS from GEA was effectively deployed.

Mr. Speaker, permit me to clarify that the disruption to our macroeconomic path over the last few years was not peculiar to Ghana. The global disruption to supply chains, adjustment to new forms of work, and shifts in demand produced some of the most cataclysmic effects on inflation and growth worldwide.

This set-off the worst form of global cost of living crises since World War II. In the US, inflation surged from a low of 1.8 percent in 2019 to 6.5 percent by 2022 and is currently at 3.7 percent. We have seen this reflect in interest rate decisions by the US Federal Reserve and also in benchmark yields. The yield on the 10-year US Treasury instrument is currently at 4.6 percent compared to 1.4 percent two (2) years ago.

And this is an economy whose currency is the global reserve currency. We see similar trends in the Eurozone and also in the UK. Inflation in the UK was 1.7 percent in 2019 and was recorded at 11.1 percent in October 2022, a 41-year high. Changing The Narrative in the Mid-Year Review, I informed this House that we had started turning the corner.

Today, it is evident that: i. We turned the corner when inflation started declining from 54.1 percent in December 2022 to 35.2 percent in October 2023; ii. We turned the corner when, despite a 1.5 percent projected growth, the economy galloped at a remarkable pace, and clocked an average of 3.2 percent growth in the first two quarters of the year; iii.

We turned the corner when the currency, which had been under severe pressure over the past two years, depreciated by a modest 6.4 percent cumulatively from February to date, compared to 53.9 percent over the same period in 2022.

The performance of the Cedi is also a reflection of 4 the fact that confidence is back, revenues have improved, and that the recovery is indeed real and is here to stay; iv. We turned the corner when companies started going back to the job markets to hire workers; v. We turned the corner when the International credit rating agencies, which have not been favourable to Ghana in recent years, started being positive about our economy; and vi. We turned the corner when the Banking industry started to record and report a profit-after-tax growth of 43.8 percent (GH¢6.2 billion); vii. We turned the corner when in record time we completed the IMF 1st Staff Review of 6 Performance Criteria, 3 Indicative Targets and 3 Structural Benchmarks.

Ghanamps.com

The Attorney general and minister for justice, Godfred Yeboah-Dame has said, the accused person, in Nana Appiah Mensah, was on 30th August, 2023, charged with thirty-nine (39) counts of the offences of defrauding by false pretense, fraudulent breach of trust, operating a deposit-taking business without a license, selling gold, inducement to invest and money laundering, at the High Court, Accra (Financial Division 1).

According to him the matter has been called in court and the plea of the accused has since been taken where he pleaded guilty.

He made this kwon when he answered an urgent question on the floor of the House posed by Member of Parliament for Lower Manya Krobo Ebenezer Okletey Terlabi who wanted to know the status of the prosecution of Menzgold Company led by NAM 1.

Mr Yeboah-Dame further said the prosecution has, in accordance with new rules for case management, been ordered to make all disclosures and file witness statements and the matter has been adjourned to 17th November 2023 to ensure that the prosecution has complied with the orders of the court and for a date for case management conference to be fixed.

The MP in his follow up wanted to know if the accused has indeed deposited some money as being speculated in the media. This the AG noted that information came to his attention that some funds has been paid to the Ghana Police Service and there is no formal bargaining plea that has been entered into between the state and the accused person.

“Per record I have two point five million Ghana cedis has been paid by the accused person and not five million Ghana cedis” he told the House

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Members of Parliament from the Upper West Region from both side of the House have appealed to the Nana Akufo-Addo lead government to as a matter of urgency fix the Bamboi-Wa road network as it connects Ghanaians to Burkin Faso from Southern Ghana and Burkina Faso to Ghana.

According to the MPs, in September this year the rain washed off the link road making it difficult for commuters, adding that a journey which should take forty-five minutes from Bamboi to Wa takes two hours.

Ahead of the 2024 budget statement to be Presented by Finance Minister Ken Ofori Atta on Wednesday, November 15, 2023 they urged President Nana Akufo-Addo and Roads Minister to seriously consider it.

Member of Parliament for Wa West Lanchene peter Toobu at a press conference with members of the Parliament press corps said, “if you hear what the Burkina Faso drivers who use that stretch say about Ghana “it’s so shameful”, he said.

In his appeal, the Member of Parliament for Wa Central Dr. Hassan Abdul-Rashid Pelpuo who is the caucus chairman note that the road needs immediate attention; the road was patch but with the coming in of the rains it got cut off because heavy trucks ply the road and “we are here to complain very loudly to government and to call on government to act immediately to support the reconstruction of the road to ensure that that link is restored and at the press conference you have MPs from both side of the House all here to complain that there is the need for a quicker link.”

Again, we do appreciate government’s effort initially to create the link this is a situation where we can have vehicles passing the road but that effort did not go far enough. We are calling on government and the road minister and president to intervene for a quick action to get the road back into shape, he stated.

“Further, we are calling on the media to send this message out so that we can have our road back; we can have economic activities back in the two regions and restore hope and confidence in the people; the road from Bamboi to Wa is very bad.”

He was emphatic that the road does note know NPP or NDC; “when armed robbers come, it does not matter the party you belong to, there are a lot of people using that stretch to Burkina Faso.”

He said the people of Upper West also deserve a better road and there are a number of accidents you cannot count and this is the second year of roads, “and tomorrow being a budget day, we want to see some action in the budget.”

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Minister for National Security Albert Kan Dapaah has honored invitation extended to him by Parliament to brief the House on the situation in Garu where security personnel from the National Security and Ghana Armed Forces brutalized some civilians.

According to him the Ministry deployed five counter terrorism officers to Garu in the Upper East Region. When they arrived in Garu they were besieged by an irate youth who were armed with weapons including AK 47 despite the fact that they introduced themselves as national security personnel.

The irate youth went ahead to fire multiple rounds at the black Toyota Land Cruiser the officers were occupying, forcing them to drive to the police station to seek refuge. But the youth followed them to the police station, circle them and fired at them again.

Mr. Kan Dapaah further told the House on Monday, November 13, 2023 it took the timely intervention of the military to evacuate the national security personnel from the police station and the House should agree with him that the attack on the personnel was reprehensible and should be condemned in no uncertain terms.

“ In other jurisdictions such attack would be consider as attack on the state, both security agencies conducted joint operations to take weapons use by the irate youth to attack the national security personnel after the operation and report emerge of excess of some of the personnel who conducted the operation”.

The National Security Minister after his remarks further told the House he could not make or answer issues from the lawmakers because the issue was before court and lawmakers should be circumspect in discussing the issue as it has some security implications.

More especially the security situation in Bawku as counter terrorism operations is going on in the area and nothing should be done to demoralise the National Security Personnel; and he is prepared to cooperate with the House.

Rt. Hon Alba Kingsford Sumana Bagbin pointed out that if the National Security Minister had said the matter was before court and would not make any remarks that would have ended the matter, and he has been in a tight corner.

But he is compelled to ask the MPs from the affected constituency to make some remarks on the floor of the House.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com