Finance Minister Seth Terkper has defended government's borrowing record stating that the seeming rise in the country's debts is "on the account of the depreciation of the cedi."

"It is true that or debt levels are increasing but I think we should put things in context.  A lot of the debts we are talking about is also on the account of the cedi," Seth Terkper said in an interview with Joy News Editor Dzifah Bampoh.

"If you borrowed 20 dollars and because you have to repay by raising dollars in cedis and buying the dollar then what you would have is that if the exchange rate is 3, your exchange rate payment is 60; if it is 4, your rate payment becomes 80," he explained.

He cited a typical example between 2013/2014 financial year when as a result of the exchange rate depreciation, Ghana's debt rose by 33 billion as a result of dollar increase.

He was responding to the assertion by the IMF which was reiterated by the Minority Spokesperson on Finance Dr Anthony Akoto Osei  that Ghana is a high risk debt stressed country.

The Minority has expressed great worry over what it fears to be a looming debt crisis for Ghana.

Ghana's debt to GDP is inching close to 70 per cent with the public debt standing at some 89 billion cedis. Despite the rise in the debt portfolio, Government has brought some new loan agreements to Parliament seeking approval from the House for some development projects.

Chairman of the Parliamentary Accounts Committee Kweku Agyemang Manu said if the trend is not curbed, Ghana may soon be heading to the crisis in Greece which has seen the European country suffocating under a mountain of debt.

But the Finance Minister disagreed. He told Joy News every country borrows for development.

"The US borrows for infrastructure; Germany borrows for infrastructure; every country borrows for its infrastructure," he said, adding when Ghana "pretended" to finance the gang of six projects on its own budge it failed.

He said government is rather in the business of "smart borrowing," by contracting loans either to refinance some debts already contracted or to execute projects that will pay for themselves.

He challenged the Minority in Parliament to come up with a more ingenious way of contracting loans that will not affect the tax payer.

Crisis & Stabilization Fund

Government is said to have borrowed 200 million cedis from the Stabilization Fund to support the budget activities, something Obuasi West MP Kweku Kwarteng has kicked against.

He argued the Stabilization Fund cannot be touched until and unless there is a crisis situation in the country.

But the Finance Minister in defending government's decision to borrow from the Stabilization Fund said: "What else is crisis if your gold, cocoa, crude oil prices are going down. What else is crisis if you do not recognise the two-and-half-years of shortfall in gas supply from the West African Gas Pipeline.  If you take the combination of all these together and you don't define them as crisis then I don't know what else is crisis."

The Minister was buoyant in the performance of the country's economy.