On the 7th of February 2024, the vice president and presidential candidate of the NPP, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, delivered desperate falsehood and vain spin cloaked as a vision for his presidential ambitions. The NDC UK and Ireland Chapter was saddened to hear that Bawumia aka the Lying One, has so debased the vice presidency such that he does not think twice before pronouncing downright falsehood and visionless untruths to the respected Ghanaian populace. Whilst we do not doubt that the discerning Ghanaian citizen saw through the Lying One’s deceitful gimmicks and academic dishonesty in full display on Thursday, we feel duty-bound to expose the now infamous Dr Pinocchio for who he is.
The Lying one opens his address in stating that Ghana’s economy was in decline when the NPP inherited the reins of power on 7th January 2017. This is in stark contrast to the IMF’s forecast of GDP growth for 2017 and 2018 as contained in their third review under the 2015 IMF Extended Credit Facility dated October 2016 (IMF Country Report No. 16/321). The forecast showed that, based on the prudent economic management of President John Dramani Mahama and his hard work to bring onstream two new oil wells, Ghana’s economy was to grow at 7.4% in 2017 and 8.4% in 2018. Appendix 1A of Ghana’s budget did indeed report GDP growth at 8.4% in 2017 and 6.3% in 2018. The question that is begged here is what work did the Lying One and his men at the Economic Management Team do in 2016 that got the IMF to forecast, with a high degree of precision, the GDP growth rates for 2017 and 2018.
Additionally, the NPP government did not even read its budget until 2nd of March 2017 and it would have taken a few more months for the budget to be programmed and implemented for any tangible impact. It is telling that the growth rate of 8.4% in 2017 was heavily driven by the growth of 80% in the oil and gas sector resulting from the work on the two new oil wells coming onstream and the 19.4% growth in the electricity subsector of industry which was attributable to massive mobilisation of power generating assets by president Mahama. As an economist, the Lying one fully knows that Ghana’s economic growth in 2017 and 2018 is attributable to President Mahama’s hard work. We therefore wonder why the Lying one pretends otherwise.
Source: IMF Country Report No. 16/321. October 2016
Bawumia deceptively contends that key economic indicators were moving in the right direction from 2017 until COVID-19 struck in 2020 and war broke out between Russia and Ukraine in 2022. However, he fails to acknowledge that the right direction of 2017 to 2019 is largely attributable to the good work of the President Mahama administration. When the full effects of the NPP’s mismanagement of the economy and reckless borrowing started kicking in, things started getting so bad that the IMF and World Bank rated Ghana as being at high risk of debt distress in their Debt Sustainability Analysis report of December 2019. This diagnosis was 4 clear months before COVID hit the shores of Ghana. It is in fact the receipt of over Ghc30 billion of COVID funds that staved off Ghana’s debt crisis for another year or two.
It is obvious that the problems of Ghana’s economy today can be directly linked to the NPP’s reckless borrowing which saw public debt soar from GHC120 billion at 56% debt-to-GDP ratio in 2016 to over Ghc600 billion at 92% debt-to-GDP ratio by 2022. It is therefore unsurprising that by the time the curtain of COVID was being lifted in September 2021, Ghana was kicked out of the capital markets for being effectively bankrupt. It is this reckless borrowing and mismanagement of the economy by Bawumia the chairman of the Economic Management Team (EMT) and his clueless bunch at the EMT that has bedevilled Ghana’s economy ever since. The ghost of Bawumia’s reckless and feckless management of the economy is still haunting Ghanaians today as it led to a default on repayment of our debt, a debt exchange programme that has robbed savers, investors and pensioners of their hard-earned savings and plunged the country into a hyperinflationary period of high prices that peaked at 54.1% inflation rate in December 2022.
Instead of apologising to the good people of Ghana and walking off the political pitch in utter shame, the Lying one still has the effrontery to peddle untruths on his economic achievement whilst playing the ostrich on the gargantuan failures of his government. Any decent politician who wrecks such havoc on Ghanaians should be exiting politics and apologising not claiming to be the best candidate for the presidency.
It must be noted that no economy operates in a vacuum and all economies experience external shocks. President Mahama and the NDC inherited power from President Kuffour in 2009 when the Global financial crisis was in full swing leading to the Eurozone debt crisis in Greece, the collapse of major global banks such as Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns in the US, the bailout of the Lloyds banking group and nationalisation of Northern Rock in the UK, the Icelandic financial crisis and the Dubai financial crisis. The NDC also managed the economy through the 2013/14 commodity price crunch which saw prices of our cocoa and gold foreign exchange earners drop significantly as well as the Ebola outbreak. Therefore, COVID-19 and the Russia-Ukraine war are just a continuation of external shocks that challenge the economy and should be no basis for failure if the right fiscal buffers were in place.
GDP growth
We note with great outrage how the Lying one has deliberately cherry-picked and deceptively manipulated statistics to paint the NPP as better managers of economic growth. Bawumia has been vice president and chairman of the EMT since 2017. Given President Mahama was also vice president and chairman of the EMT from 2009 to 2012 and president thereafter to 2016, we would expect any decent comparisons between President Mahama and Bawumia to compare President Mahama’s 8-year period of government from 2009 to 2016 to Bawumia’s nearly 8 years in government from 2017. This would have amounted to comparing apples with apples. Any such comparisons show President Mahama and the NDC are superior managers of the economy compared to Bawumia and his NPP. President Mahama and the NDC recorded an average growth rate of 9.02% over their 4 year first-term period from 2009 to 2012 and 3.9% for 2013 to 2016. Comparatively, Bawumia and his NPP recorded average growth of 5.3% in their 4-year first term period of 2017 to 2020 and 3.2% in their second-term period of 2021 to date. Clearly, when comparing term by term, president Mahama and the NDC beat NPP by 9.02% to 5.34% in respective first terms. President Mahama and the NDC equally beat the NPP by 3.92% to 3.22% when second terms are compared. Using the 8-year averages, president Mahama boasts an 8-year growth average of 6.47% compared to 4.43% for Bawumia and his feckless NPP. Bawumia knew very well that a comparison of economic growth term by term or by full 8-year terms would expose him as an economic failure. He therefore chose to deceptively compare the second term economic growth rate of 3.9% for president Mahama and the NDC to the first-term economic growth rate of 5.3% for the NPP. This is a clear act of dishonesty unbefitting of one who aspires to high office in Ghana. Records from the World Bank’s World Development Indicators database for Ghana show that President Mahama and the NDC are better managers of the economy when considering growth rates between the year 2000 to date.
GDP growth – NDC versus NPP
Source: World Development Indicators data. World Bank. 2023 data from IMF ECF Press release(May 2023) confirmed by World Bank (Oct 2023).
Table comparing average GDP growth by terms and the 8-year average.
| Party | First term | Second term | 8-year average |
| NDC | 9.02 | 3.92 | 6.47 |
| NPP | 5.34 | 3.22 | 4.43 |
Source: World Development Indicators data. World Bank
President Mahama versus VP Bawumia
Source: World Development Indicators data. World Bank. World Bank. 2023 data from IMF ECF Press release(May 2023) confirmed by World Bank (Oct 2023).
Source: World Development Indicators data. World Bank. World Bank. 2023 data from IMF ECF Press release(May 2023) confirmed by World Bank (Oct 2023
Bawumia’s deceptive chart on average GDP growth which cuts out 2009 to 2012 data
Sourced from Dr Bawumia’s 7th February speech.
Industry
In a characteristic deceitfully selective demeanour, Bawumia chose to narrow down to the agriculture and industry sub-subsectors to paint a deceptive picture of superior economic performance. Unfortunately for him, just like in the case of the overall GDP growth rate, we found that he was deceitfully manipulating the data to paint a picture different from the real trend. For the industry sub-sector, again the data from the World Bank’s World Development Indicators database for Ghana shows that President Mahama and the NDC are better managers of the industry subsector of the economy when considering growth rates between the year 2000 to date. The records show that President Mahama and the NDC achieved an average industry subsector growth rate of 16% in their first term of 2009 to 2012 and 2.9% in their second term of 2013 to 2016. Comparatively, Bawumia and his NPP recorded inferior industry subsector growth rates of 7.5% in their first term and -0.25 in their second term to date. Here again Bawumia is caught red-handed trying to compare the NPP’s first term performance with the NDC’s second term performance. Given his groundless and unsubstantiated hype about being an economic whiz kid, perhaps he felt shamed by the NDC’s impressive performance of 16% industry growth and the NPP’s shockingly mediocre industry growth of -0.25% in their second. This explains why he chose to blind himself to the existence of both.
Industry growth – NDC versus NPP
Source: World Development Indicators data. World Bank. 2023 data from Appendix 1C of the 2024 budget
Source: World Development Indicators data. World Bank. 2023 data from Appendix 1C of the 2024 budget
Table comparing average GDP growth by terms and the 8-year average.
| Party | First term | Second term | 8-year average |
| NDC | 16.03 | 2.9 | 9.46 |
| NPP | 7.5 | -0.25 | 4.18 |
Source: World Development Indicators data. World Bank
Source: World Development Indicators data. World Bank. 2023 data from Appendix 1C of the 2024 budget
Bawumia’s deceptive graph on industry growth which cuts out 2009 to 2012 data
Sourced from Dr Bawumia’s 7th February speech.
Gross International Reserves
On gross international reserves, Bawumia again paints a very deceptive picture of superior performance over the NDC. However, records submitted by Bawumia himself as part of the EMT to the IMF as part of Ghana’s application for a $3 billion ECF and published in the IMF’s May 2023 IMF Country Report No. 23/168 shows that Gross International Reserves have been declining consistently since 2016. The Gross International Reserves table on page 5 of that document clearly shows that Bawumia is being untruthful when he embraces a superior posture in managing the Gross International Reserves of the country,
Source: IMF’s May 2023 IMF Country Report No. 23/168
Bawumia’s deceptive graph which contradicts data he provided to IMF per the above graph
Sourced from Dr Bawumia’s 7th February speech.
Exchange rates
On exchange rates, it is clear that President Mahama and the NDC inherited an exchange rate to the dollar of Ghc1.2 in 2009 and handed it over to the NPP at Ghc4.2 to the dollar in January 2017. This shows an increase of 3 currency units from 1.2 to 4.2. Bawumia and his NPP have ironically increased the cedi exchange rate from 4.2 by 8.4 currency units to 12.6 in the 8 years to 2024. Bawumia fully knows he is a bad manager of the Cedi and has therefore resorted to the use of averages to cover his shame. Data from the Bank of Ghana’s historic interbank FX rates seriously exposes Bawumia’s fecklessness on exchange rate management. The data shows that after Bawumia’s vain claim to have locked the dollar up in mid-2017 at an exchange rate of about Ghc4.3, the dollar broke jail and galloped to a high of over Ghc13 in November 2022 and now comfortably sits at an exchange rate of over Ghc12 and rising. This trend when visualised is a clear source of shame to Bawumia and the NPP, hence their desperate embrace of average movements in exchange rates to paint a less damning picture.
Historic US dollar to Cedi interbank exchange rate from (December month ends)
Data sourced from BoG historical Interbank FX rates database.
Data sourced from BoG historical Interbank FX rates database.
Bawumia’s deceptive graph using average movements to mask real trends
Sourced from Dr Bawumia’s 7th February speech.
Jobs
On jobs, Bawumia baselessly claims that the NPP created 2.1 million jobs with 1.2 million of those jobs being recruitment into the public sector. However, Bawumia’s claims are seriously exposed as fraudulent by the Ghana Statistical Services’ Earning Inequality report of 2022 published in January 2023. The report shows that the total number of public sector workers in Ghana, as per the December 2022 payroll) stood at 688,000 (687,984 to be precise). How then is it possible that Bawumia and the NPP created 1.2 million public sector jobs if the number of such jobs only stood at 688,000. Further, the 2021 population and Housing Census shows an overall unemployment rate among 15 years and older at 13.4%. The unemployment rate rises to 32.8% among those aged 15 to 24 years of age. President Mahama and the NDC left the unemployment rate for young persons aged 15 years and older at 8.4% in 2016. Over 1.7 million remained unemployed as of 2022 compared to just over 1.027 million unemployed in 2016. How is it possible then that after supposedly creating 2.1 million jobs between 2017 to 2022, Bawumia and the NPP ended up increasing the unemployment rate by at least 5% from 8.4% to 13.4% and increasing unemployment by about 700,000 between 2016 to 2022. This clearly shows that Bawumia was clearly peddling untruths on his wild claims about job creation.
Source: 2021 Population and Housing Census (GSS)
Unemployment rate by selected age groups and locality
Source: 2021 Population and Housing Census (GSS)
Bawumia’s deceitful and feckless vision
Ladies and gentlemen of the press and fellow compatriots, time will not permit me to interrogate all of the untruths and distortions peddled by Bawumia in his now infamous speech. But it is clear from the analysis so far that his speech was hollow, empty, deceitful, and riddled with distortions and plain untruths. I will proceed to briefly tackle one of the economically illiterate fiscal policies Bawumia puts out as his vision. This is his proposal for a flat tax rate.
Flat tax
Bawumia has proposed to implement a flat tax of a percentage of income for individuals and SMEs as his visionary fiscal policy on taxes. What he forgets is that flat taxes are regressive taxes that place a higher burden on lower earners. Ghana’s current progressive tax regime allows for the tax rate to rise as taxable income increases. The tax rate starts from 5% for the first Ghc110 monthly income above an allowance of Ghc490 and rises to 35% for taxable income exceeding Ghc50,000. This ensures high earners with monthly income of over Ghc100,000 pay a tax rate of 35% on the portion of their income exceeding Ghc50,000 while those earning about Ghc4000 pay no more than 17.5%.
Under Bawumia’s regressive tax, both lower and higher earners will be charged the same flat rate of tax. Not only will lead to a lower tax take and be unacceptable to the IMF under the current ECF programme, but it will also disproportionately place a higher burden of taxation on the vulnerable low earners and poor. This elitist tax policy will only benefit Bawumia’s wealthy friends who will get a very generous tax break from that policy. For example, if Bawumia sticks his flat tax rate at 10%, then his wealthy friends and cronies who earn over Ghc100,000 a month will pay the same 10% just like the poor watchman who earns barely Ghc3000 a month. It is very sad that an economist of Bawumia’s stature will advocate a flat rate regressive tax without considering the negative distributive effect of that tax on income and the disastrous effect of such a flat regressive tax on Ghana’s finances which are already in the IMF’s Intensive Care Unit. By proposing such a reckless tax policy, Bawumia exposes the fact that he has learnt nothing from his calamitous chairmanship of the EMT and the chronic incompetence with which he and his henchmen in the NPP have destroyed the Ghanaian economy.
Cost of living
Bawumia sells a false vision of reducing the cost of living if voted into power. It is however curiously mysterious that he failed to tell Ghanaians how he has fared in terms of reducing the cost of living for them in the last 8 years. Bawumia as chairman of the EMT has supervised a high inflationary environment over the last 8 years which hiked up the cost of living and destroyed many livelihoods and businesses. Bawumia has created a high inflation regime in Ghana by hiking inflation to a historic record high of 54.1% in December 2022. It is therefore unsurprising that he remained very loudly silent on inflation throughout his speech. The Consumer Price Index Inflation Bulletins from Ghana Statistical Services going back to 2008 show that President Mahama and the NDC have a superior record on inflation management compared to Bawumia and his NPP. It clearly shows that president Mahama, as vice president and chairman of EMT and later president, inherited an inflation figure of 18.2% from President Kuffour and then managed so well to record 32 months of single-digit inflation from June 2010 to February 2013 before handing over an inflation rate of 15.4% to Bawumia and his NPP. Bawumia, as vice president and chairman of the EMT could only manage 24 consecutive months of single-digit inflation from April 2018 to March 2020. Bawumia’s disastrous management of inflation led to a historic record inflation rate of 54.1% in December 2022. Clearly, this terribly feckless record on inflation explains his loud silence on it in his speech. With such a disastrous record on inflation, who will believe Bawumia when he proposes to reduce the cost of living in Ghana.
President Mahama versus Bawumia on inflation management – CPI comparison
Source: Ghana Statistical Services Monthly Consumer Price Index Bulletins data
Conclusion
What Bawumia put out on 7th February 2024 is not a vision but a vain and timid attempt to steal the future of the youth and further destroy Ghana’s economy through arrogant fecklessness and naked untruths. Ghanaians cannot afford to be taken on another vain ride by Bawumia and his NPP. Ghanaians must ignore Bawumia’s false promises, pretentious denials of responsibility for destroying the economy and insincere pleas to be tried again. Ghanaians must rise up and reject Bawumia and his NPP emphatically on December 7th, 2024.
The Writer is Chairman of NDC UK & Ireland Chapter
