Former Finance Minister, Seth Terkper, is cautioning the government against celebrating the achievement of the first phase of the International Monetary Fund Programme.

According to him, there are still major challenges within the economy such as high inflation and interest rates, and therefore celebrating the narrowing of the primary balance by the government is not ideal or the way to go.

This is because it is the least target Ghana must achieve, according to the IMF.  

Speaking to Joy Business, Mr. Tekper said the government must not be complacent, but rather work hard to revive the economy, particularly ensure the country’s debt is sustainable.

“If you consider when [inflation] it cross 40% that is another three fold, and you looking at debt at 57% of Gross Domestic Product, now closely to 100%. Even when you take out the contingent liabilities and others, if we are in the 90% right from 57% of GDP that is doubling of the debt to GDP ratio. I granted an interview and wrote a short article which said that we should not be made complacent by those who are in the position to know were Ghana's economy is in at the moment”.

“I think it is particularly after the debacle of the BoG [Bank of Ghana] showing the extent to which the deficit [fiscal] was monetize, the economy was monetize which is the course of the inflation that we talking about. I think it is a bit too early especially for our friends from the international community to be singing our praises”, he added.

The former Finance Minister explained further that though the economy is recovering, there are still risks to the outlook.

“I am not saying there hasn't been any success so far in terms of the injection of foreign exchange by the multilateral institutions in particular into the economy to try and stabilise the situation, particularly significant flows of COVID-19 funds. During the COVID-19 period, about ¢60 billion which is six times what we have always use to turn around the economy was injected into the economy”.

 “Remember no government has done a turnaround of the economy using more than $1 billion”, he added.

He concluded, saying, it is going to take Ghana a long way to reduce its budget deficit to 5% of GDP, which is the target for the Fiscal Stabilisation.