Mahama left Akufo-Addo ‘weak’ economy - Ofori-Atta

The Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo-led government of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) inherited a “weak” economy from the John Mahama-led National Democratic Congress (NDC) administration, Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta has said.

Mr Ofori-Atta said this while presenting the mid-year Budget Review and Economic Planning statement to Parliament on Monday, 31 July 2017.

He, however, assured Ghanaians that despite the wobbly economy bequeathed to Mr Akufo-Addo, the government will work to restore confidence and grow the economy.

“Mr Speaker, we inherited a weak economy characterised by high fiscal deficit, 9.3 per cent of GDP on a cash basis against the then-target of five per cent on cash basis. A primary deficit of 1.4 per cent of GDP against a target surplus of 1.2 per cent, a high debt-to-GDP ratio of 73 per cent of GDP, high inflation of 15.4 per cent, low credit to the private sector, high interest rate, 91 per cent treasury bill rate at 16.4 per cent, weak domestic revenue mobilisation, low external reserves of 2.8 months of import cover, policy reversals including some unconstrained expenditure, seven billion of our standing commitments and un-discharged obligations and weak economic growth of 3.5 per cent – the lowest in 15 years,” Mr Ofori-Atta said.

He added: “But Mr Speaker, permit me to reassure this august house that the Akufo-Addo government is not daunted by this statistics that were passed on to us.”