Renowned Ghanaian economist and politician, Kwame Pianim is urging the government to assess the economic situation and develop innovative solutions to grow the economy rather than relying solely on external donors.

According to him, these donors demand a lot from the country, such as high interest rates, which has hurt Ghana's economy and subsequently affected development.

Speaking on the JoyNews’ AM Show on February 26, he explained that until this economic evaluation is done, a global crisis will consistently cripple the country's economy.

He said this is the reason the government consistently blames the country’s economic crisis on COVID-19 and geopolitical tensions, such as the Russia-Ukraine war.

“Also, the donors of the international community, they have become meaner and meaner, they are not as generous as they used to be. And just recently, the World Bank itself has come to say that the G20 framework for debt restructuring is not good enough.

“You know when they first mentioned it the government of Ghana and Nigeria refused to be part of it, but when we got into crisis we wanted to restructure under the common framework. The common framework is saying if you give a haircut to Eurobond users you have to give a haircut to your domestic investors also. It never happened. It is nonsensical,” he said.

He added that the government had no option but to resort to the International Monetary Fund for a bailout since the economy was weak.

Mr Pianim asserts that this assistance has forced the country to restructure its debt, a situation that has affected many individuals and businesses.

He stressed that this would make it difficult, as investors would not want to invest in the country, further crippling the economy.

"The common framework is saying, if you give a haircut to Eurobond holders, you have to give a haircut to your own domestic investors. It never happened; it is nonsensical because of what you are doing when you are giving a haircut here to our pensioners. They are the most vulnerable people who are holding bonds,

“Also, you are making it difficult for Ghanaians to save and invest at home. You are weakening the economy by not growing it to be able to pay the debt that we owe. So, I think that right now that the World Bank itself has come to say that we need a different framework so that we get a better debt relief, we ourselves should take a better look at it,” he added.

The economist added that the woes of citizens are further compounded as many of them are expected to pay more taxes.

On the back of this, he stressed that there is an urgent need to evaluate the economy.

“We have to rest the button and focus on growing the economy. Where we are now, increasing taxes would not help us. We will not be able to collect. What we need to do is to cut expenditure, and cutting expenditure means we have to go back to Ghanaians and say maybe this school feeding programme we need to take a look at. Maybe the free secondary school education we need to take a look at and tweak it,” he added.