2019 budget not all that hopeless – Ricketts Hagan

Former Deputy Finance Minister, Kweku Ricketts Hagan has said that the 2019 budget statement presented on the floor of parliament by the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta is not entirely “hopeless” as suggested by the minority caucus few days ago.

The Minority in Parliament, a day before the main budget presentation predicted that Ghanaians will experience hell in 2019.

According to the NDC MPs, government was only going to compound the current hardships being experienced with more taxes, borrowing and bad policies in the 2019 budget presented to Parliament on Thursday.

Speaking at a pre-budget round table discussion, Minority spokesperson on finance Cassiel Ato Forson said the 2019 budget was hopeless and will burden the already overburdened Ghanaians.

“Our analysis show that Ghanaians are in for a tough time in the year 2019. There is no indication that there will be a change in government’s policy direction, we therefore cannot agree with his Excellency the president on the claim of hope in the 2019 budget.

“Ghanaians should expect the following, we expect new taxes to deal with the financial sector mess they have created with their populist policies…we expect the prevailing hardship to persist and may even get worse.

“The worsening unemployment situation will continue, more debts accumulation…an upsurge in government expenditure and populists policies and we expect the issuance of a century bond which is over and above the absorption capacity of the economy,” Ato Forson said at the roundtable discussion.

But contrary to the views of the minority, the Cape Coast South MP, says although he’s not enthused about the budget, there are some aspects of it that will actually yield good results for the country.

“There is nothing in the budget but I must admit that there are certain aspects of the budget that I think is good and it will solve a lot of problems when implemented….but with this budget, most of the things they mention in there are just repetition of what they said in the 2017 budget and I don’t seem to understand this government” he told Akwasi Nsiah on Anopa Kasapa.

However he was unable to pin-point portions of the budget statement that caught his attention and admiration.