Don’t heap all Ghana’s debts on NDC government – Finance Minister
Finance and Economic Planning Minister, Seth Terkper has assured that Ghana does not have any problem with her debt portfolio as it is being serviced regularly.
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What he finds as a fallacy, he says, is the perceptive capture of same as the creation of the present government alone when in fact, it is the accumulated borrowing by the country over the years and across governments.
He assured a gathering of business, economic and finance bigwigs at the Graphic Business/ Fidelity Bank breakfast meeting on Thursday that the country’s current account situation will consolidate.
“We are still disbursing. If you took a 40-year loan 20 years ago, you are still servicing it. So often the perception that all the stock of loans that we have now were by the current government is wrong, but it is about solutions, we want to focus on solutions, not acrimony or recrimination, no.”
Another fallacy, he said, is that not all the loans are public debts.
Seth Terkper explained that “The pure public debts are the ones we take for hospitals, schools and clinics. But even when you talk about hospitals, schools and clinics, as I’m fond of saying, if any of us here, God forbid, falls sick and we need a scan or something in Korle Bu, bought from a loan, we pay fees. I don’t think it’s free for anybody, even for the poorest. How come a portion of those fees (is) not used to maintain the equipment? And when it comes to repairs, when it comes to replacement, or to enhancements … and everything, we come back to central government.”
He said there are institutions whose internally generated funds are much bigger than whole allocations to some ministries, yet not much is seen of their effective use of those funds.
According to the minister, coming changes aimed at enabling state-owned enterprises to borrow on their own balance sheets will see to the reduction of the burden on the taxpayer from supporting SOEs that should be self-supporting.
“Even if we do not recover hundred per cent, 60 per cent recovery will still be less burdensome to the taxpayer,” he said.
Among suggested solutions, he said, is that government’s access to concessionary financing should be properly channeled, so that those meant for social infrastructure are channeled appropriately while those for commercial production are also properly channeled, with the state moving away from absolute unfettered sovereign guarantees.
He said it is up to the SOEs to own the policy, however they should know that they cannot depend on the taxpayer all the time.
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