BoG Secretly Prints Ghc5.5billion For Gov’t As Ghana’s Debt Balloons To Ghc236.1bn

The Bank of Ghana has come under allegations of secretly printing money for the Akufo-Addo government to use for “operations.”

The Minority in Parliament made this allegation, saying the central bank has already supplied Ghc5.5billion to the Government and is in motion to print more.

Minority spokesman on Finance, Cassiel Ato Forson, points out that the BoG’s actions are in flagrant violation of Act that establishes it.

“The 2019 Domestic Revenue was ¢51,988.01m and 5 per cent of this is about ¢2,599.40m Regrettably, the Bank of Ghana has already disbursed ¢5.5 billion to finance Government of Ghana’s operations without recourse to the laws of Ghana,” he said.

 “In any case, why has the Bank of Ghana become an extension of the Ministry of Finance? Instead of government aggressively embarking on fiscally austere measures such as pruning down the size of government by cutting down the number of government appointees to make savings, the government is rather stampeding the resources of the Bank of Ghana at will,” he said in a statement.

According to him, the Minority has decided to write the Chairman of the Finance Committee to summon Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta and the Governor of the BoG for questioning.

Apparently, Mr. Ofori-Atta and the BoG Governor have managed to strike an unholy partnership that enables the BoG to print new money and supply it to the Government for its operations.

Meanwhile, the Minority has also pointed out that the country’s huge debt burden translates to every single of the 30 million Ghanaians, owing almost Ghc8,000.

With the country’s public debt now at ¢236.1 billion, each Ghanaian owes ¢7,836. Mr. Ato Forson makes the point that the huge debt is due to the Government’s appetite for reckless borrowing.

“I have been looking at the Summary of Economic and Financial Data for May 2020 put out by the Bank of Ghana. It is intriguing to observe that Ghana’s total debt stock as of March 2020 stood at ¢236.1 billion,” he said.

“The data further reveals that Ghana’s debt increased from ¢120.3 billion in December 2016 to ¢236.1 billion by 31st March 2020. Despite his vociferous public debt politics in opposition, President Akufo-Addo has added some ¢116 billion to our public debt in just three years and a few months.”

Analyzed closely, President Akufo-Addo’s debt accumulation is almost akin to Ghana’s entire public debt since independence, noted the Minority spokesperson on finance.