Atik Shushes NDC...NPP Has Made Deliberate Interventions To Stabilize Economy

NDC Member of Parliament for Bongo, Edward Bawa says the stability of the economy with particular regard to achieving a single digit inflation was as a result of prudent economic decisions by the previous government.

Speaking on Peace FM's "Kokrokoo", Hon. Bawa indicated that the Nana Addo administration has since its inception not made any major interventions nor policies to revamp the economy.

To him, the NPP shouldn't claim credit for the stability in the nation because all positive economic indicators were the achievements under Ex-President John Mahama's regime.

According to him, the Mahama government had put measures in place to achieve a single digit inflation before it was voted out of power.

Hon. Edward Bawa noted that the NPP government is only riding on the coattails of the Mahama administration.

We, even as a country, had indicated that even by June this year; [we would have had] we would have captured a single digit in terms of inflation…However, we missed it because (1) in terms of our oil production went down because the FPSO challenges we encountered. (2) We had issues of power crises, particularly the last end of 2015 and some part of 2016. So, these two major things brought, for example, in terms of our revenues came down…

“…however, when we stabilized the power generation programme and the FPSO started producing the right volumes, when you look from June (because there was now stability) all the indices started showing positive signs. We had stability of the Ghana cedis. We saw that inflation moved from around 18% to 13 point something in December...Which major intervention brought about these positive indices? The point is these were based on the fundamentals that had been put in the (short term) sorry, medium term policy framework that we started to get positive signals from June till date”, he stated.

But General Secretary for the People's National Convention (PNC), Atik Mohammed, discounted claims by the Bongo MP, stating emphatically that the NDC-Mahama government left the country "without much in the coffers".

To him, but for certain deliberate interventions by President Nana Akufo-Addo and his government, the country would not have had the positive economic effects that Hon. Bawa is gleefully referring to.

"When you come and the coffers are empty, if you’re not tactical; you might end up implementing a policy which will boomerang in a matter of 2 years”.

He said the NPP inherited liabilities from the previous government, hence it's inability to roll out a large-scale economic intervention programme within the government's six months of administration.

They’ve not fared well in all the indicators but the part where they’re done well, I think they’re deliberate interventions of government and that’s why we’re seeing such positives,” Atik stated.