Former Finance minister Seth Terkper says the Nana Akufo-Addo government’s failure to redeem maturing bonds has further limited the use of tax revenue.
According to him, the government currently spends 98.2% of tax revenue for interest payment and wages because of their strategy “adding bonds, pushing out maturity date and not redeeming.”
Mr. Terkper in a series of tweets said the move is a reversal of the policy direction of the John Dramani Mahama administration, which led to the redemption of the 10-year bond contracted by the John Agyekum Kufuor administration in 2007 when it matured in 2017.
He said the 2007 bond was paid off in 2017 with $200million left in the Sinking Fund for final redemption.
The former Finance minister indicated that his government also spent the entirety of the US$1billion bond secured in 2015 on refinancing whiles setting aside an extra US$250million as seed money for the GIIF.
He said his government also made it a policy to use “lower bond proceeds for investment, refinancing, seed capital and redemption.”
He said his government managed to do all this with revenue from just one oil field as against the NPP’s three.
Seth Terkper also took a swipe at the current government for its appetite for consumption.
He said he was “not envious at all” with the Nana Akufo-Addo government’s administration’s approach of “piling debt and not redeeming.”
“In fact next to bank bailout and energy costs (despite GH₵28billion of ESLA by 2022), the largest adjustments (increases) in the 2020 Supplementary Budget are the interest and wages. COVID comes in a pale 4th position,” he tweeted.
Story: Sena Nombo/Radiogoldlive.com
