Accra-based Joy Business is reporting that it has received confirmation that a US$50 billion Trust fund that the International Monetary Fund has made available for vulnerable and middle-income countries is off-limits to Ghana.
According to the report, sources in Washington DC have explained that Ghana cannot apply for the fund because it is not under a programme with the IMF.
Being under an IMF programme, the report reveals, is a pre-condition for accessing the fund.
Ghana’s economy is currently in a serious mess, with a debt conundrum that has scared investors away causing foreign exchange shortages that have led to galloping inflation and plummeting value in the local currency.
However, the Akufo-Addo government has parried all advice to seek a bailout from the IMF, fearing that such a program will curtail spending so that Akufo-Addo for instance can no longer charter expensive private jets for his junketing pleasure.
The government is afraid that if it seeks the bailout the conditionality that will come with it will make it difficult to splurge during the next elections.
Hence the government has vowed to tax Ghanaians instead.
The Trust Fund which will be in a form of a grant will have gone to shore up the country’s international reserves at the Bank of Ghana or the Balance of Payment.
According to the IMF, the 50 billion dollar Trust Fund is expected to assist member countries to minimise the impact of Covid-19, climate change and the Russian-Ukraine war on their economies.