Gold for Oil: Government needs to be transparent – Kwame Jantuah

During this year’s edition of the New Year School launch, the Vice-President of Ghana, Dr. Alhaji Mahmud Bawumia, stated that, in view of government’s effort to bridge the space between the Dollar and Ghanaian Cedi and also to reduce the prices of fuel products, it has received the first consignment of the Gold for oil programme enrolled by the government.

Experts have in the past few days projected the prices of fuel to shoot up by some percentages in the coming months even with the gold for oil programme and this has raised lots of concerns and arguments on the essence of the policy if fuel prices are still expected to go up, though the National Petroleum Authority of Ghana has also come out to say fuel prices would see a reduction by the first quarter.

On the back of this, Energy Expert and Head of Political Affairs at the Convention People’s Party (CPP), Kwame Jantuah, has called on the government to be transparent with the gold for oil policy and also help Civil Society Organisations with better communication to give a clearer understanding to the issues surrounding it.

According to him, it breeds less confidence in a government and a policy when government and major stakeholders do not seem to have some form of connection when conversations are made with regard to a certain policy rolled out.

“I think it’s a bit not disingenuous but it doesn’t breed confidence when you ask a minister, you ask the Bank of Ghana and there doesn’t seem to be any connection. People not knowing what everybody is doing if they are working as a team… they should sing from one hymn sheet,” he said.