Mahama is not the person to take economic lectures from – Dennis Aboagye

Presidential Staffer, Mr Dennis Miracles Aboagye has said that Former President John Dramani Mahama is not the person Ghanaians will want to take economic lectures from.

He said Mr Mahama had the opportunity to govern the country between 2013 and 2016 but failed to deliver hence, cannot be making pronouncements on the economic issues that he could not achieve.

The former Municipal Chief Executive (MCE) for Akuapem North said these on the New Day show on TV3 with Johnnie Hughes, Friday July 1 when reacting to an address on the economy given by Mr Mahama on Thursday July 30.

“We have already experienced the man, we know what he can and cannot do. He is the last person we will want to take economic lectures from him.

“When he had the chance in 2013 and 2016 was he able to achieve them?”

Mr Mahama said among other things that the e-levy was presented as the panacea to the economic problems of Ghana.

He said Ghanaians were in fact told, that it would enable government reduce borrowing.

True to the predictions and cautions to government about the overly ambitious revenue and fiscal policy targets, he said, available first quarter data show that those targets will not be met.

In his view, this will no doubt create even bigger credibility crisis for what he described as a battered economy.

“For the entire month of May, the much-vaunted e-levy, which was rammed down the throats of Ghanaians, yielded a paltry GHS 54 million against a target of GHS 475 million for that month representing only 11.3%. The month of June has not offered any sign of improvement as only about GHS 7.1 million had been collected by the first week of the month. These figures demonstrate that so far, the e-levy has been a spectacular failure and has become the mother of all nuisance taxes and I wish to reiterate my earlier promise that we will abolish it in the very first budget statement to be presented under the next NDC administration,” Mr Mahama said while speaking on the economy on Thursday June 30.

Whereas total tax revenue of GHS 14.6 billion was projected to be collected for the first quarter of this year in the 2022 budget, he said GHS 12.8 billion was collected.

This amount, he explained was not enough to meet the debt service payment for the same period which stood at GHS 13.9 billion.

“In other words, all the taxes collected by government in the first quarter of this year, was less than the total amount paid in interest on our debt which was GHS 10.68 billion and amortization of GHS 3.3 billion. Expressed in percentage terms, total debt service for the first quarter of this year was equal to 108% of all the taxes collected by government in the same period.

“It is the reason why government is unable to provide textbooks and other teaching and learning materials for our schools and has raked up huge arrears to statutory funds like the NHIS, District Assemblies Common Fund, GETFund among others. Out of the GHS 1.3 billion that government budgeted to pay domestic contractors in the first quarter of this year, only GHS 38 million was paid whilst absolutely nothing was paid out of the GHS 285 million that was budgeted for arrears clearance in the first quarter of 2022,” the 2020 presidential candidate for the National Democratic Congress (NDC) said.

source: 3news