BoG issues becoming albatross around neck of NPP, govt - Bempah

A Deputy Director of Communication of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Ernest Owusu Bempah, has charged the Bank of Ghana (BoG) to provide a detailed and better explanation of the issues surrounding the new headquarters that it is building and also the GH¢60.8billion loss it incurred last year.

In the view of Owusu-Bempah, these issues are becoming a major headache for the government, especially its communicators, hence the need for the central bank to explain in layman's language, the issues that are happening.

The Minority in Parliament has been asking the central bank to provide answers to questions relating to the new headquarters for the bank.

The Minority is requesting, among other things, information on the processes involved in the procurement of the land for the construction of the new headquarters building.

They also want to know the names of consultants and project managers.

Speaking to journalists in Accra Monday, August 21, Ernest Owusu Bempah said "The whole brouhaha with the Bank of Ghana is becoming a problem for the government and party in power and so if they have anything to explain, they should. NPP as a political party we don't condone wrongdoing, we don't condone anything to do with alleged malfeasance or corruption.

"This particular issue is becoming an albatross around the neck of the government and the party in power. So they need to come out clean, the explanation that they are giving, we don't get it so they should come out and explain better.

"The Governor of the Bank of Ghana needs to sit up and come clean so that the government will look good. This issue is becoming a danger for the political fortune in the 2024 elections. Financially, we are going through turbulence, but as a party, we have done a lot in managing the economy and then the next day you hear this scandal coming from the Bank of Ghana.

"As a spokesperson for the NPP, I want to tell the Bank of Ghana to come clean and let us know exactly what is going on. They cannot sit somewhere and be explaining things the way they want.

"There is an allegation of missing money and there is another allegation of building a $250million headquarters, this is a serious thing. Bank of Ghana is a big financial economic institution of the state that runs the whole economic activities of this country. So you cannot just come out and throw issues out there just like that and expect the ordinary Ghanaian to understand what is going on. So they need to come out clean and let the people of Ghana understand so that party communicators can go out there and explain the issues better."

It would be recalled that in a press statement issued by the Member of Parliament for Bawku Central, Mahama Ayariga, who is also a private legal practitioner, he called on the Governor of Bank of Ghana to provide specific details on the project.

They had chosen Tuesday, September 5 as the date to march to the head office of the Bank of Ghana in an escalated action to force the Governor and his two deputies to resign.

The National Democratic Congress (NDC) Members of Parliament (MPs) gave Dr Ernest Yedu Addison and the two Deputy Governors – Dr Maxwell Opoku-Afari and Elsie Addo Awadzi – 21 days to resign after they posted a GH¢60.8 billion in 2022.

The Minority Leader, Dr. Cassiel Ato Forson, on Monday, August 21, wrote to the Accra Regional Command of the Ghana Police Service to notify them on the action to “occupy” the Bank of Ghana.

“The purpose of this protest is to express our revulsion against the illegal printing of money (about GH¢80 billion) between 2021 and 2022 by BoG for the corrupt Akufo-Addo/Bawumia/NPP government which led to a hyper-inflation rate of 54.1% in December 2022,” the Minority indicated in its letter.

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