President John Dramani Mahama has stated that the
government is not on a desperate adventure for
financial support from the International Monetary Fund
(IMF).
However, he said, if the discussion to be entered into
with the Fund resulted in any money, the government
would welcome it.
“If it comes with money, that is fine,” President Mahama
said in an interview with Bloomberg TV Africa in
Washington.
In his first public comment on the IMF issue, the
President explained that the support the government
was seeking from the IMF centred on a discussion and a
programme the government was looking at.
Ghana has decided to enter into discussions with the
Bretton Woods Institution to support her home-grown
economic recovery programme.
Some critics see the move as going for a bailout, but
government ministers have persistently denied that.
Ghana is going through one of its most difficult
economic times in its 57-year-old history, with the
national currency plummeting about 40 per cent against
the dollar this year.
President Mahama expressed the hope that the IMF's
assistance would help build investor confidence in the
country.
“If having a closer relationship with the IMF will give
that confidence to our partners to be able to work
together to achieve that, we are happy to do that,” he
said.
President Mahama said the government was getting
ready to sell $1.5 billion in Eurobonds by the end of
August this year.
He said the decision to move the nation from a lower
middle-income to a middle-income country was on
course.
The IMF has, in a response to the government’s request,
declared its readiness to help Ghana overcome its
economic challenges.
A statement from the Fund said the institution would
send a team to Ghana in early September to begin the
discussion with the Ghanaian authorities.
Ghana is the second country in sub-Saharan Africa to
move to the IMF for assistance this year.
The first was Zambia, which in June, this year, sought
talks with the Fund.
Source: graphic.com.gh