Can prayer alone ‘resurrect’ the cedi?
I am not an apostle, a bishop or a pastor. In fact, I am not even a catechist. My understanding of the Bible might, therefore, be very limited.
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I am a Christian and a believer of miracles by God. From Mark 10:46-52, we read of Jesus healing the blind man Bartimaeus, without even touching him. He only said to Bartimaeus: “Go your way; your faith has made you well.” And immediately he received his sight.
We also read from Mark 5:25-34 about a woman who for 12 years had a flow of blood and never had a cure from great doctors, but only touched the garment of Jesus and had an instant healing.
Similarly, there is another miracle at John 11:1-45, where Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead after the latter had died and had been buried for four days.
So I believe in miracles by God, and also believe that the same God can do miracles today. However, I was amazed to hear Archbishop Nicholas Duncan-Williams commanding the cedi (our currency) which has lost so much value to appreciate.
“I hold up the cedi with prayer and I command the cedi to recover and I declare the cedi will not fall; it will not fall any further. I command the cedi to climb. I command the resurrection of the cedi. I command and release a miracle for the economy,” he prayed.
I have been very concerned about some Ghanaians attacking pastors who express concerns about certain national issues. Recently, Rt Rev. Stephen R. Bosumtwe-Ayensu, the Methodist Bishop of Obuasi, came under severe attacks from some government spokesmen for expressing his views about the Ghanaian economy.
For this reason, I would not follow those who have described Duncan-Williams’ prayer for the ‘resurrection’ as comic relief or him as a hypocrite as one pastor has described him because he failed to address those who are in charge of the falling cedi.
The cedi was being exchanged at GH¢2.20 to one US$1 before Christmas but now it is being exchanged at GH¢2.60, while the pound sterling which was GH¢3 is now GH¢4.20.
Worry
My worry about the archbishop’s ‘command’ is that as one of the influential people in the country and very close to the presidency, he seems to have either overlooked or is pretending not to see the cause of the fall of the cedi.
The archbishop also forgets that much as prayer solves problems, prayer alone cannot solve all problems. Even Jesus Christ himself, the master of miracles, told his disciples that not all problems can be overcome with only prayer or ‘commands’.
In Matthew 17:14-21 (and also Mark 9:14-29), a man whose son suffered from epilepsy sent him to the disciples of Jesus to heal but after using the name of Jesus, they still could not heal the boy. When the disciples sought the reason for their inability to heal the boy, Jesus told them in verse 21:” …this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.”
This means that even Jesus did not have one solution for all problems, neither did he use one strategy for his work. He also taught us that in some cases the miracles would come when people physically did their part. In Luke 5:1-8, instead of Jesus commanding fishes to come from the sea to fill the canoes of Peter and his friends who had worked all night without a catch, Jesus rather asked Peter to work by casting his net again into the sea before that bumper catch was made.
It seems Archbishop Duncan-Williams had over-simplified the current problem with the Ghanaian economy; hence, he thinks by prayer only the cedi will appreciate. If so, why hasn’t it appreciated after his prayer?
I’m not an economist so I hate to talk about economics, especially on a public platform. My Makola or Kejetia understanding of the causes of currency depreciation include lack of fiscal discipline, mismanagement, corruption and so-called ‘macro and micro koo miniini’ which our economists use to bully us to show their understanding of the Bretton Woods language.
When the Bank of Ghana was set up in 1957, its major task, I want to believe, was to enforce monetary discipline in the economy. Has the bank been doing that in recent years? How have we, as a nation, managed our finances – are we spending more than our income? Yes, we have been doing that; and this can cause the cedi to depreciate.
Records at independence
Records indicate that at independence our external reserves were about $269 million, but how much do we have now? By December, 2012, our budget deficit was said to be GH¢8.7 billion (12 per cent of GDP).
Has Archbishop Duncan-Williams per chance heard of GYEEDA, Subah Infosolutions, SADA, Isofoton, Woyome’s GH¢51 million, Waterville, Asongtaba, the GH¢15 million Akomfem project, GH¢33 million trees which did not exit, and others, and how much state funds had gone into all that?
Directives from the late President John Evans Atta Mills to ministers of state not to pay money to Woyome were flouted with impunity, yet those involved are free and even insulting the rest of Ghanaians with their utterances and continuous stay in high positions? Do we need just prayer to command the cedi to appreciate or some drastic action?
I stayed in the UK for over a decade. I worked and made some savings. I could have brought this money to Ghana through other means but I chose to transfer the pounds sterling from my UK bank account to my Ghanaian bank account. To my surprise, the Bank of Ghana (BoG) has introduced a law that charges me 2.5 per cent of my money each time I do a transfer from the UK to Ghana through the bank.
Does anyone expect me to continue to bring my hard-earned pound sterling to Ghana through the bank when I can bring it through other means? And has anyone bothered to find out how many Ghanaians abroad have stopped sending money to Ghana through the banks due to this bad law? If the Governor of BoG can just sit down and calculate how much money comes from remittances from Ghanaians abroad into this country, he would quickly abolish this law which is depriving the state of foreign exchange.
Mobilisation of brains
Archbishop Duncan-Williams has direct and unfettered access to the President so the best he can do for this country is to talk to the president’s men and women who are sleeping on their job and pushing our economy into a total collapse. The state of our economy has passed the NDC-NPP politics; it needs the total mobilisation of the brains of all our economists to salvage it. President Mahama needs our honest thoughts and support to improve the economy.
One thing I observed about the NPP when it was in opposition before it came into government was that each time the NDC government presented a budget, its then Minority Spokesperson on Finance in Parliament, Dr Kofi Konadu Apraku, came out with an alternative budget telling Ghanaians what was wrong with the budget and what could be done to correct it. The NPP has stopped that healthy practice.
So Archbishop Duncan-Williams, I’m sure if Jesus were to be physically in your church that day, he would have told you: “my son, yes prayers work, but for the Ghanaian cedi to appreciate, the government, its officials, opposition parties, and the people must change their corrupt and negative attitudes, mismanagement of resources, politicisation of serious economic issues, and rather work hard.” Can somebody say Amen!
PS: Inspector-General of Police, the children and widow of Adjei Akpor, the 22-year-old man your men killed at Adenta on January 6, 2014, are still waiting for your action.
The author is a journalist and political scientist. He is the Head of the Department of Media and Communication Studies, Pentecost University College, Accra. - [email protected]