Wednesday,
May 14, 2014
Former President John Rawlings has said that the current economic
dilemma facing the country can be traced to 2001 when Kufuor took over the
administration of the country.
Describing the economic situation in the
country as "almost dead", ex-President Rawlings said that it would require
selfless men and women to clean up the situation.
He was speaking to a cross-section of
journalists at Senchi, the venue for the National Economic Forum which began
today.
The Forum has brought together key
personalities to brainstorm on Ghana's economy and to find out how to arrest
the current economic challenges facing the country.
Ex-president Rawlings, who was one of the
invited guests at the Forum, said that the country is in a pretty tight
situation and "we cannot escape with ease," unless we are able to trace
the genesis of the problem.
Do you agree with Rawlings on his
assertion that the current economic dilemma facing
the country can be traced to 2001 when Kufuor took over from him? I don’t.
Ghana has never been
economically sound despite all its over-abundant natural and human resources.
Even when it was the Gold Coast under the thumb of the British colonial
administration, it wasn’t economically sound. Otherwise, those who masterminded
the 1948 nationwide rioting and arson won’t have any cause to complain.
But they complained
against the economic situation, blaming the Association of West African
Merchants (AWAM) for the unbearable cost of living. They particularly cited the
cost of a packet of St. Louis sugar, which sold at tupence (two pence) to
justify their protests.
What began in the
immediate post-independence era under Nkrumah as indigenization and agro-industrialization
didn’t put the economy on an even keel. The situation worsened such that
opponents of Nkrumah who celebrated his overthrow noted loudly that they couldn‘t
even get milk to drink.
And Nkrumah’s
reaction? If he had known that it was milk that Ghanaians were looking for, he
would have made the drains of Accra flow with milk! But it was too late to undo
the harm.
Succeeding
governments couldn’t salvage the economy. Not even the late Kutu Acheampong’s
robust efforts in the era of his National Redemption Council could. When the
NRC metamorphosed into the Supreme Military Council and “Kalabule” took over,
the economy sagged to its knees and couldn’t be redeemed ever since.
Nothing came from
Hilla Limann and his PNP administration to save it. Neither could Rawlings do
so despite the draconian measures that his government took.
Swallowing its pride,
it wore a thick knee-pad to beg the IMF for redemption, which resulted in the
adoption in April 1982 of the Economic Recovery Programme (and its
appendages—Structural Adjustment Programme, etc.) that ended up imposing stiff
conditionalities on Ghana to worsen the economy.
Ghana’s external debt
obligations increased but living standards didn’t pick-up, which was one major
complaint against the Rawlings administration that would work to the advantage
of Kufuor and his NPP at the 2000 general elections.
Thus, when Kufuor
ushered Ghana into the club of the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) in
order to reap the benefits promised by creditors, hopes rose that the economy
would be redeemed. Policies implemented by Kufuor didn’t differ much from what
his predecessors had used to no avail.
When the going became
too tough, Kufuor used a short-cut—the redenomination of the Cedi (at what cost
to Ghana nobody knew), creating the impression that the Ghanaian economy had as
much weight as strong ones. The dollarization of the economy hasn’t helped in
any way.
Come the Atta Mills
government and the situation remained dire only to be compounded by what has
necessitated the National Economic Forum today.
So, can’t we see
clearly that the problems confronting our economy couldn’t have erupted in 2001
when Kufuor entered office?
I strongly believe
that Rawlings’ assertion was only aimed at fingering Kufuor and his
administration for political mischief, which I deplore strongly because what is
to happen at Senchi (Akosombo) is expected to be bleached white of partisan
politics. It is a mere matter of ECONOMICS: Identifying the problems with the
economy and providing input to solve those problems.
It doesn’t call for
any name-calling or blame-giving. It calls for forthrightness in pinpointing
the factors undermining the economy and offering suggestions to rebuild the
economy. I hope the Forum will be used for its stated purposes and narrow
politicking shunned.
I shall return…
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E-mail:
mjbokor@yahoo.com
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the conversation.
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