‘Election can engender good investment climate’
The Minister of Finance, Mr Seth Terkper, has called on Ghanaians to see the forthcoming elections not only as a political event but an opportunity that could engender a conducive investment climate and provide great economic benefits to the nation.
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He recalled that in 2013, the country was constrained due to the 2012 election year expenditure and the low prices of cocoa and gold on the international market and said the Supreme Court judgement on the 2012 election petition and its acceptance by the parties concerned, led to the country receiving the best rate ever for its bonds on the international market.
Addressing the 58th Annual General Meeting of the Association of Ghana Industries (AGI) in Kumasi yesterday, Mr Terkper said: “When the decision of the election petition was delivered by the Supreme Court and was accepted by the parties involved, we moved on as a nation and Ghana had the best rate we ever had for the bonds because it gave Ghana higher democratic credentials.”
The Finance Minister said in addition to the low prices of the country’s major commodities on the world market, gas was also not flowing from Nigeria to generate electricity and the country could not raise the money domestically to finance its budget.
He explained that to raise everything domestically would have meant higher interest rates for local banks, crowding out the private sector, while at the same time resources were needed to refinance the loans and, therefore, the road show had to be started for the bonds.
He recalled further that judgement on the election petition was expected around the same August 2013, when the decision was being made for the bond, for which reason some people suggested that the exercise should be truncated but he insisted that he had confidence in the courts, especially when everything was being telecast live, a proof of transparency.
Exim Bank
The Finance Minister hinted that “pretty soon” Ghana’s Exim Bank would be established to provide credit for exports as a means of assisting the private sector with credit guarantee to increase the nation’s export.
Already the board, of which the AGI is a member, had been formed and inaugurated.
He added that the fund would have links with the Ghana Export Promotion Council, the Food and Drugs Authority and the Ghana Standards Authority, to ensure that exports to destinations outside the country, would not be confiscated or thrown away because of low standards to cause losses to the exporting companies.
He said the government was in discussion with the European Union (EU) on the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) to look into the opportunities, while the United States government had also been contacted for discussion on AGOA on the 10 products that could be exported by local industries.
AGI
The President of AGI, Mr James Asare-Adjei, complained that businesses had been made to pay new taxes this year without consultation and that members of the association were unhappy with the development and were in discussions with the Ministry of Finance, particularly so because of the negative effect of the development on their businesses.
He said with the support of the BUSAC Fund, the AGI had engaged a consultant to carry out a study on the tax regime, relating to the private sector and that the study would provide comprehensive information on the various taxes and recommend those that required reform.