[ 2016-11-15 ]

My 'tough' decisions were for the best: Mahama
President John Mahama has said the local currency,
the cedi, has stabilised due to the prudent fiscal
measures his government has put in place over the
past years.

According to him, his government had taken
“tough” decisions which had ultimately
stabilised the cedi and also ensured a reduction
in the inflation rate.

Addressing captains of industry at a breakfast
meeting in Accra on Monday November 14, Mr Mahama
said: “The success of business and industry is
our success. We (Government) have to take tough
decisions, and I am sure that you all understand
that we had to take them in order to create a
better environment for you.”

He added: “The most serious threats to
businesses and the private sector is unstable
economy and an unstable economy exists when you
have the deficit rising unsustainably. It means
government is spending far more than it is earning
and it has to finance that deficit in some manner.
And, so, because the deficit was going up, of
course inflation too started going up, interest
rate ballooned and the cedi started depreciating.
No business can survive in an environment like
that and so I want to thank industry and the
private sector for your support in some of the
hard times that we had to take some of these tough
decisions. It was ultimately for the good of all
of us and we are beginning to see the results
showing. Inflation did a dramatic dip and we hope
that it will end at what we targeted – at least
14 per cent by the end of the year. And we hope
that going into 2017 we can bring it down to a
single digit. The cedi has stabilised quite
comfortably, I think it makes businesses more
predictable, knowing that the currency will not be
uncontrollable.”

“I know that what affects business most is
interest rates and high cost of borrowing and that
is why we have introduced a public debt management
strategy that tries to control government
borrowing. We are trying to create a situation
where we don’t crowd out the private sector and
happily if you look at the statistics, crowding is
reducing because government is reducing
continually its domestic borrowing.”

Source - Classfmonline

... go Back