Isaac Adongo, MP for Bolgatanga Central has taken swipes at the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta, the President, Nana Akufo-Addo and the Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia over the recent inflation rates in the country.
Mr. Adongo took to his Facebook page to draw the Veep’s attention to the rising inflation rates and ask what had become of his [Dr. Bawumia’s] digitalisation drive.
The lawmaker took the opportunity to also say that the Electronic Transfer Levy (E-Levy) continues to be a nuisance tax adding that it “will give government more negative sentiments than money.”
The MP said at most, government could only generate Ghc720 million a year from the E-levy. This falls short of the government’s expected revenue of Gh4.5 billion for this year and Ghc6.9 for the subsequent years.
Here is Mr. Adongo’s full post.
When told them Ghana’s current inflationary pressures are supply-side pressures, they still believed it was caused by demand through excess liquidity. Clearly, the policy rate hike has become inconsequential in dealing with the economic mess as I indicated on Metro TV at the time.
Unfortunately, the E-Levy is proving to be a super nuisance tax that will give Govt more negative sentiments than money.
If what GRA is saying is anything to go by, then it will only give Govt just about Ghc1.5 million a day and some Ghc540 million this year.
Even if we are generous to grant them Ghc2 million a day from E-Levy in subsequent years, Govt would only generate Ghc720 million a year. That is disastrous for the E-Levy that would solve all our problems.
Where is the $2billion they promised would come in between 2-6 weeks to shore up the cedi? This was announced by Ken Ofori Atta on 24th March 2022 and repeated by Nana Addo in his State of the Nation Address a few days later.
It’s been almost 8 weeks and not a cent has arrived. The forex market is getting jittery with traders and businesses reverting to precautionary and speculative demand for dollars.
The cedi faces an imminent spike in depreciation as the deception of Govt is exposed with dire consequences for the economy.
The proposal by utilities to hike tariffs in excess of 150% at a time of rising fuel prices and hikes in transport fares would now create high non-food inflation to an already record inflation caused by unprecedented food shortages and hunger.
Dr Bawumia, you see your size? Where are you with the digitalisation of inflation, cost of living and the cedi depreciation?
Source: A1radioonline.com|101.1MHz|Mark Kwasi Ahumah Smith|Ghana
