A member of Parliament's Finance Committee Mark Asibey-Yeboah says government is being "untruthful" with the ongoing discussion about staff rationalisation in the civil service.

Contrary to assertions by the Finance Minister Seth Terkper that there will be no layoffs as part of the implementation of the IMF programme, Asibey-Yeboah told Joy News "staff rationalisation can be equated to retrenchment."

Ghana went for an IMF bailout of some $940million but the amount came with it some conditionalities including the complete removal of subsidies and staff rationalisation.

Even though the government has begun implementing aspects of the IMF's conditionalities the bit on staff rationalization   has been withheld until 2017.

Finance Minister Seth Terkper told news men in Accra, Wednesday, there will no retrenchment in 2017.

He explained staff rationalisation is a comprehensive civil service reforms which will deal with recruitment, job description, promotions, rules and guidelines in the civil service.

He said with such rules and regulations in place no one public officer will feel his colleague has been promoted because he is closer to one minister or another.

He assured rationalisation of staff in the civil service does not in any way mean there will be dismissals.

But Assibey-Yeboah is not convinced. He told Joy News if staff rationalisation was so good why will the government wait until 2017 to begin implementing that part of the policy.

He warned staff rationalisation in 2017 is nothing more than "vote for me now and i will lay you off in 2017.

Having had discussions with a number of IMF staff members and thorough discussions held with others on the issue, the MP is convinced Ghanaian civil servants will be retrenched in 2017.

"They don't want to be upfront with the Ghanaian people so there is some untruth in all of these discussions going on," he indicated.