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Wampah sworn in as Governor with mandate to ensure sound monetary policy

President John Dramani Mahama has charged the Bank of Ghana (BoG), the Ministry of Finance and the government’s Economic Management Team to work assiduously to bring inflation back to a single digit, reduce interest rates and end the dollarisation of the country's economy.


He said it was crucial to reverse inflation to a single digit, reduce interest rates to competitive levels to support the local private sector and ensure the predictability of the cedi in the interest of the economy and for foreign investors.

President Mahama made the call Thursday when he swore into office the Governor of the Bank of Ghana, Dr Henry Kofi Wampah, at the Flagstaff House, Kanda in Accra.

He administered the oaths of allegiance, office and secrecy to Dr Wampah.

In attendance were the Vice-President, Paa Kwesi Bekoe Amissah-Arthur; the Minister of Finance, Mr Seth Terkper, and the Chief of Staff, Mr Prosper Douglas Kweku Bani.

Dr Wampah took over the BoG in acting capacity in 2012 after his immediate boss, Mr Amissah-Arthur, had been nominated by President Mahama as his running mate in the 2012 presidential election.

He assumed the position of First Deputy Governor of the Central Bank in April 2009.

Before  his appointment at the BoG, Dr Wampah was the Director of the Research and Statistics Department at the West African Monetary Institute.

Inflation, which had been on a single digit since June 2010, hit 10 per cent in February 2013.

On the other hand, the average interest rate is around 23 per cent.

President Mahama gave his personal commitment to support efforts at reducing the rate of inflation.

"We will continue to do all we can to ensure that inflation goes back to a single digit and remains in single digits," he said.

On interest rates, he said one of the major complaints of businesses and industry had been high interest rates.

He said even at times when the government managed to tame inflation, interest rates remained high because of the risks involved in doing business in Ghana.

The President affirmed the government's resolve to work with the governor to bring down interest rates to make the cost of borrowing cheaper for the private sector.

"If we, indeed, want the private sector to grow and lead the growth of the economy, then that sector cannot continue to borrow at the kind of interest rates that our banks are offering.

"So one of the areas we will work with you to try and make things easier for the Ghanaian private sector is to bring down interest rates to competitive levels, so that we can help the growth of the economy," he said.

Touching on the dollarisation of Ghana's economy, the President commended Vice-President Amissah-Arthur, who is the immediate past Governor of the BoG, and Dr Wampah for their work in 2012 to halt the decline of the cedi.

He said the cedi remained relatively stable, but indicated that "we need to do more to ensure that we protect that stability to make sure that the cedi operates in a predictable manner, both in the interest of the economy and for foreign investors".

President Mahama said one of the things that the government did was to regulate foreign transactions even better.

He said the nation needed to strengthen the regulation, especially with the dollarisation of the country's economy, as prices were indexed in dollars.

"The currency in Ghana is the Ghana cedi and we must continue to index prices in Ghana cedis. The dollar and other foreign currencies are a means of international exchange and trade and are not supposed to be the indicators of what currency prices we have," he said.

The President gave an assurance that the government would respect the independence of the central bank, but said that independence made room for cooperation.

He assured Dr Wampah of his cooperation and expressed the hope that the new governor would be able to discharge his duties to the admiration of all Ghanaians.

For his part, Vice-President Amissah-Arthur said the government would seek Dr Wampah's support in terms of the analysis of the economy to help in its management.

He expressed the hope that with Dr Wampah's rich experience and knowledge, he would do a great job to continue with the economic stability in the country.

In response, Dr Wampah pledged that the bank under his administration would support the government to achieve its objectives of creating a prosperous economy.

His first preoccupation, he said, was to continue to pursue a strong and resilient economy, microeconomic stability and growth, a sound monetary policy and ensure the maintenance of price stability.

The governor said the recent rise in inflation to about 10 per cent was mainly due to upward adjustments in petroleum prices in February 2013.

Story: Musah Yahaya Jafaru

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