Debates of 16 Mar 2021

MR SPEAKER
PRAYERS 2:57 p.m.
FORMAL OMMUNICATION 2:57 p.m.
BY THE SPEAKER 2:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker 2:57 p.m.
Hon Members, item numbered 2 -- Formal Communication by the Speaker.
I have two communications from H. E. the President. I have, on your behalf, responded to one which I felt was very urgent and so, I would want to apprise the House of the content of the Communication.
The first was in respect of the Budget Estimates, and this was with regard to that of the Judiciary and the Judicial Service and on Parliament and Parliamentary Service. The letter is dated 11th March, 2021. I will read the one in respect of the Judiciary and the Judicial Service.
Mr Speaker 2:57 p.m.
The next is Parliament on our Budget Estimates. 3.07 p. m.
Mr Speaker 2:57 p.m.
In view of the urgency of this matter, since we are the final determinants of the Budget
for all the arms and sectors in the country, I had to quickly respond and my letter is dated today, 6th March, 2021, to the Secretary of the Office of the President.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
We would now move to the correction of Votes and Proceedings and the Official Report.
Correction of Votes and Proceedings and the Official
Report
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
We would start with the correction of Votes and Proceedings of Friday, 12th March,
2021.
Page 1…7
Mr Issifu Seidu 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, on page 7, number 236, is “Seidu, Issifu”. My first name is “Seidu” and the surname is “Issifu”. Besides that, I have two titles to add to this name, “Alhaji” and “Baba”. “Baba” means “father” in my tradition and I was named after my grandfather, so at home, I am called “Baba Seidu”.
So, with your permission, I would want my name to be “Baba Seidu Issifu''.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
“Baba'' is not a title -- it is a name. I would accept the title “Alhaji'' but I would not accept the title “Baba''.
Mr Alexander Afenyo-Markin 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, perhaps, if the Hon Member for Nalerigu/Gambaga, could help us with the name he used to file with the Electoral Commission because the Electoral Commission communicated to the House and that was captured in the list when we first met before the swearing in. So, if he may assist us?
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Hon Member, could you assist the House?
Mr Issifu 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I filed with the Electoral Commission as “Issifu'' as my surname and “Seidu'' as my first name but popularly and at home because I was named after -- in my tradition, the “Baba'' means “father''. It is not a name but depending on where a person comes from -- So, I am “Alhaji Baba Seidu Issifu''.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
The identity of “Issifu Seidu'', is not the same as the identity of “Baba Seidu Issifu'' -- they are two identities and you voluntarily opted to be identified, through the Electoral Commission as “Baba Issifu''. You did not even add the “Alhaji'' and now you want us to add that. You know the proper thing to do -- there are lawyers in the House who could assist you at a fee.
Mr Afenyo-Markin 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, we cannot accept the “Alhaji'' because when he filed his name with the Electoral Commission, he did not add it and the Electoral Commission communicated “Mr'' to this House. He may lead this House into temptation if we give him a new title. I agree with you that he has to swear an affidavit to get the proper thing served on the House through the Clerk to Parliament than using the backdoor for new titles and all that. It is unacceptable and I am sure he would be guided accordingly?
Mr Issifu 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I am guided.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
I would call on the Table Office to take on board the fact that your surname is “Issifu'' and your first name is “Seidu''. That would be corrected so that you would now belong to the “I'' column and not the “S'' column.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Page 8 --
rose
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Yes, Hon Sampson Ahi?
Mr Ahi 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, with regard to items numbered 4 (4) and 4 (7) on page 8, Hon Member for Aowin, Hon Larbi, Oscar Ofori' and Hon Member for Bia West, Dr Augustine Tawiah,
respectively, both sought permission to be absent but they have been marked absent, so if the Table Office could correct that?
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Table Office, the Hon Members were “absent with permission'' and not just “absent''.
rose
Mr Darko 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, with regard to item numbered 4 (3) on page 8, I was present but I have been marked absent.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Table Office, please take note.
Mr Davis Ansah Opoku -- rose
-- 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Yes, Hon Member?
Mr D. A. Opoku 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, with regard to item numbered 4 (6) on page 8, I was present but I have been marked absent.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Table Office, please, take note.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Page 9…11 --
Yes, Hon Deputy Majority Leader?
Mr Afenyo-Markin 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, with regard to item numbered 6, I humbly hold the view that we should include “Order 161 (1) and (2)'' instead of only “Order 56
(1)''.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Table Office, take note. I even think that the word on the third line should be “presented'' and not “made a statement''. You presented the Business Committee's Report - or you made a statement after that?
Mr Afenyo-Markin 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, the terms of the “statement'' made reference to Order 161 (1) and
(2).
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
I have taken note of that one but the third line which says “made a statement on the business arranged'' should be corrected to “presented''.
Mr Afenyo-Markin 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, very well -- you are right.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Table Office, kindly take note.
rose
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Yes, Hon Member?
Ms Nkansah-Boadu 3:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, with regard to item numbered
(xxviii) on page 11, my name should be “Ms Mavis Nkansah-Boadu'' and not “Mrs Mavis Nkansah-Boadu'' because I still use my maiden name. I am not using my husband's name as at now.
Mr Speaker 3:17 p.m.
Table Office, please, do not be in a hurry. She would come properly.
Yes, Hon Majority Leader?
Mr Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu 3:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I do not know whether, a lady, after marriage decides to keep her maiden name; or she is not entitled to do so?
Hon Member, when you say that “you have not done the proper thing”, it would seem to suggest that if one does not use the title ‘Mrs' then the ‘proper thing has not been done'.
Mr Speaker 3:27 p.m.
No, the ‘proper thing' is to take the decision. Would the lady want to be known and identified as married to so and so or not? So, that decision is what the Hon Member says she has not yet taken. Then I said, well, ‘she has not taken the proper…' that is why.
However, Hon Majority Leader, you are entitled to litigate my view.
Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu 3:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, we shall reserve that to another time.
However, I think I have raised the issue raised by the Hon Deputy Majority Leader before, during the Speakership of Mrs Adelaide Bamford Addo. The first is with Standing Order 56(1); the language there is
“... the Chairman of the Business Committee shall make a statement…”
So, maybe, if we want to allow what we are saying, perhaps, we may have to change that expression I just read to read:
“Every Friday the Chairman of the Business Committee shall present a statement”.
Mr Speaker, the other one has to do with --
Mr Speaker 3:27 p.m.
Hon Majority Leader, hold on. This one is referring to the Chairman of the Business Committee but he presented the Business Statement as the Vice Chairman and not the Chairman - it is captured there as the ‘Hon Deputy Majority Leader and Vice Chairman of the Business Committee'. So, what he did was to present it on behalf of the Chairman and that is why I opted
for the word; ‘present'. However, in the Standing Orders, if you are the one presenting, it is ‘may'. Hon Majority Leader, you are right.
Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu 3:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, again, I would not want to litigate this matter because any member of a Committee, in the absence of the Hon Chairman, can do what is required of the Chairman. So, what the Hon Chairman is supposed to do that person can as well do. If a Chairman makes a statement, an Hon Member can also make a statement. However, as I was saying, I would not litigate the matter with you.
Mr Speaker, the other major thing I want to raise is in respect of Standing Order 161(2). As I said, I raised this matter with Mrs Adelaide Joyce Bamford Addo when she was the Hon Speaker of the House. After the Statement has been made and maybe, the House accepts it, should the presenter go ahead to make a Motion for its acceptance or adoption?
We usually do not do that and so, after the issues have been raised, the Speaker then would say, by hitting the gavel that the Business Statement has been adopted. In truth, if we want to be technical then after the presentation, Standing Order 161(2) going further down, would suggest that after the Report has been presented to the House, the Hon Chairman has
Mr Haruna Iddrisu 3:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I do not intend to encourage a litigation on this matter. I know that Standing Order 160(1) establishes the Business Committee, and I have further noticed that in Standing Order 161(2), as the Hon Deputy Majority Leader referred to, it reads and I beg to quote:
“At any time after the report has been presented to the House a motion may be moved by the Chairman of the Committee for the acceptance of the Report”.
Mr Speaker, expresssio unius exclusion alterius to wit; express mention of one that excludes all other things. In express words, this is the intendment of the Standing Order.
However, by practice, it has always been that when the Hon Chairman of the Business Committee presents the Report and you accommodate the concerns and inputs of Hon
Members, your guidance has always been that the House has approved of the Business Statement.
I think that by practice, we have grown to appreciate that but if the Hon Majority Leader wants us to be meticulous, then going forward, after reading the Business Statement, we would ask him to invoke Standing Order 161(2) that he comes by a Motion.
However, it has never been a practice of this House to accept the Business Statement by Motion, but he is not wrong. That is, if we want to respect the express provisions of our Standing Orders; Order 161(2), then we ought to adopt the Business Statement and its report by a Motion.
Mr Speaker, however, I think that what our practice has yielded has helped us in the conduct of our Business and he should not insist on Standing Order 161(2).
Mr Speaker 3:27 p.m.
Well, the practice is also in accordance with the Standing Orders of the House because it says; ‘may'. So, if we ought not to move the Motion, it does not mean it cannot be adopted but we could go further to decide that we will always move because it is discretionary. If that is what we want to do, there is nothing wrong with that.
After giving explanations, the Leader and Chairman of the Business Committee could always proceed to move and then we can adopt the Report.
Please, can we move on?
Page 12 … 14 --
Yes, Hon Member?
Mr Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa 3:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, please, I tried to catch your eye at page 13; the list of directives you issued on that day and conspicuously missing is the directive to the President through the Minister for Finance. I recall you even added His Excellency the Vice President, raising concern about the unacceptable ceiling for the Legislature and Judiciary.
Mr Speaker, I recall that you stressed on that directive and I am sure that is what subsequently led to some of the letters that you have read to us today but all of that has been omitted at page 13. I know that the Official Report will capture in detail, what you said but at least, we should get a sense from the Votes and Proceedings just as the directives you
made about the independent governance institutions and the referral to the Finance Committee. I thought that we should have found space as well in the Votes and Proceedings to capture the essence of that very important directive that you gave.
Mr Speaker 3:37 p.m.
Thank you, Hon Member. That is the lot of Parliament; Parliament prefers to grumble and complain in silence and not to openly come and confront the issues.
So, even the Table Office did not place much premium to the directive I gave even though that is a Budget that affects them as well and we have been at the receiving end of not properly, effectively and efficiently performing our constitutional duties. I have opted to be open and to be proactive so Table Office, please capture it properly because it was a directive from the Chair.
rose
Mr Speaker 3:37 p.m.
Your titles are now many so I do not know which one to refer to; Hon Majority Leader, Hon Leader of the House, Hon Minister for Parliamentary Affairs and the Hon Minister responsible for the Ministry of Finance.
Mr Speaker 3:37 p.m.
I think you were too busy on that day so you did not capture the essence of that directive, but I would allow the Hon Member to further explain it.
Mr Ablakwa 3:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you.

The directive from the Rt Hon Speaker was clear that the Budget revealed substantive cuts in the ceiling for Parliament and the Judiciary and that word should go to the Executive that we would not accept it. We cannot

be treated like Ministries, Departments and Agencies because we are organs of State or arms of Government. The Rt Hon Speaker was very clear that you should convey the message and His Excellency the Vice President should also take note since he was in the House that day.

This was the directive that the Rt Hon Speaker issued. However, I can understand that our Hon Leader had abandoned us because he was ensconced in the Executive and he did not join us to solidarise with our plight.
Mr Speaker 3:37 p.m.
Hon Majority Leader?
Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu 3:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I really share the principle espoused, but the language that is being used here is that a directive was issued and that is why I am asking. Properly speaking, was it a directive and to who? It came from the President so is it the case that the Rt Hon Speaker was directing the President?
This is the issue I want us to be clear about because we may create a problem if we are saying that the Speaker sits and directs the President to do something or not. However, I
think that it was a good observation and the Rt Hon Speaker and I even discussed it ahead of time, but to say that a directive was issued is where I have my difficulty.
Mr Ablakwa 3:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, it was a directive to him to convey the message to His Excellency the President since per the constitutional imperative you read the Budget Statement on behalf of the President.
Mr Haruna Iddrisu 3:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I believe that what we should all be guided is that Hon Osei Kyei- Mensah-Bonsu on that particular day invoked article 179, therefore, whatever directives that are given must be situated in context. He did not present the Budget Statement as Hon Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, but he did so for and on behalf of His Excellency the President. Mr Speaker, so whatever consequential observation and directives that you gave must be respected.
Mr Speaker, but I thought that today you have elevated the same matter to a high level with your correspondence to the Office of the President. Mr Speaker, without attempting to repeat your words, may I refer you to an article which emphasises the position that you took and for my purpose I would
emphasise on article 179(3) and (5). When you related to the Budget for the Parliament and the Judiciary, this is what the Constitution provides in article 179(3):
“The Chief Justice shall, in consultation with the Judiciary Council, cause to be submitted to the President at least two months before the end of each financial year, and thereafter as and when the need arises --”.
Mr Speaker, these words in article 179(5) are significant and it guided the position you took. It reads:
“The estimate shall be laid before Parliament under clause (4) by the President without revision but with any recommendations that the Government may have on them”.
Mr Speaker, so you have elevated it to another level and you did same even in respect of Parliament as an institution in accordance with the Act of Parliament which deals with the votes of Parliament itself.
Mr Speaker, thank you.
Mr Speaker 3:37 p.m.
Hon Members, is this open to litigation?
Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu 3:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, we want the right thing to be done for both Parliament and the Judiciary and we could take the matter up. Mr Speaker, it is not for nothing - my Hon Colleague just read article 179(3) and (5), but he should start from article 179(1). Mr Speaker, article 179(1) provides that:
“The President shall cause to be prepared and laid before Parliament at least one month before the end of the financial year …”
However, what he read says “two months” so what it means is that at least a month before it comes here, this thing should be done so that if there are any negotiations, they could be done before it comes here when it has been finalised. In this particular instance, we all know that we did not have time -- notwithstanding, I still think that it should be possible for us to resolve this matter for the appropriate thing to be done because even if what would come to Parliament has to be topped up in the mid-year review, that could be done.
Mr Speaker, but I am not sure that on account of this one would want to litigate the matter because the issue then is when did Parliament submit its own request? I do not think that this should be a matter for litigation. We
want the best for Parliament and I believe that given your own experience, we can achieve this but we cannot start on a quarrelsome note because I do not think that is appropriate.
Mr Speaker, thank you.
Mr Speaker 3:47 p.m.
Hon Members, I was the Hon Chairman of the Committee on Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs from 1997 to January, 2001 and in 2014 to January, 2017.
From 1997 to 2001, happily, my Ranking Member was H. E. Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo. We worked together and fought for the observance of this constitutional provision. Luckily, we are now in the position to make sure that it is complied with. At that time, we were just Members of Parliament; a Chairman of a Committee and a Ranking Member, and so our voices did not carry much weight.
Now we are in the position to ensure that we all comply with the Constitution. And I, as the Rt Hon Speaker would ensure that the right thing is done. [Hear! Hear!] Once
the principle is accepted, let us move on. I am sure H. E. the President would readily comply with it. So please, let us move on with the correction of the Votes and Proceedings.
Page 12?
Mr Afenyo-Markin 3:47 p.m.
Mr Speaker, we got to page 14 where Dr Zanetor's title has changed to “Mr”.
Mr Speaker 3:47 p.m.
Thank you.
Page 14?
Mr Afenyo-Markin 3:47 p.m.
Mr Speaker, there is a correction to be made. Item numbered 2(xii), Dr Zanetor is captured as ‘Mr Zanetor'.
Mr Speaker 3:47 p.m.
Table Office, please, that is my daughter and not my son. Dr Zanetor Agyeman- Rawlings. Please, kindly take note.
Page 15?
Hon Members, the Votes and Proceedings of the 22nd Sitting of the First Meeting of the First Session held on Friday, 12th March, 2021, as corrected is hereby adopted as the true record of Proceedings.
Hon Members, I have the Official Report dated Wednesday, 3rd February, 2021. Any corrections?
Mr Samuel O. Ablakwa 3:47 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I have one correction to make at column 007 in the second paragraph. In the sixth line, it should read “COCOBOD” without the “Board” after it. It is tautological, and so just “COCOBOD” would suffice.
Mr Speaker 3:47 p.m.
Hon Member, you are right.
Hon Members, the Official Report of Wednesday, 3rd February, 2021, as corrected represents the true record of Proceedings.
Even though I have admitted a number of Statements, I have been guided by Leadership to rather allow those Statements to be read tomorrow and not today.
So we would move to the Commencement of Public Business. Item numbered 5 -- the Motion, that this honourable House approves the Budget Statement and Economic Policy of the Government for the year ending 31st December, 2021. This was moved on Friday by the Minister of State responsible for the Ministry of Finance - commencement of debate.
I have two lists, one from each Side of the House. I would start from the Minority side and call on the Ranking Member of the Finance Committee.
MOTIONS 3:47 p.m.
Mr Kojo Oppong-Nkrumah (NPP -- Ofoase/Ayirebi) 3:47 p.m.
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
I beg to second the Motion that this honourable House approves the Budget Statement and Economic Policy of the Government for the year ending 31st December, 2021.
Mr Speaker, I would want to start by congratulating the Hon Majority Leader and for the time being, the Minister of State in charge --
Mr Speaker 3:47 p.m.
Hon Member, we have agreed on some time limits. I just would want to draw your attention to it. We finally agreed on 25 minutes for the Hon Member who seconds the Motion. The Chairmen and Ranking Members of the Committees would have 15 minutes and my Colleagues, the backbenchers, would have 10 minutes each.
We agreed that we would debate till 9.00 p.m. We want Hon Members to do a good job. If the 9.00 p.m. is too much, at least, Mr Speaker would get the sense of the House, and we would take the decision.
Please, Hon Member, you have 25 minutes starting from now.
Mr Oppong-Nkrumah 3:57 p.m.
Thank you once again, Mr Speaker.
Mr Speaker, I beg to second the Motion that this honourable House approves the Budget Statement and Economic Policy of the Government for the year ending 31st December,
2021.
Mr Speaker, as I was intimating earlier, I would like to start by congratulating the Hon Majority Leader and for the time being, the Minister of State responsible for Finance for delivering the President's Budget with such command on that memorable day. Our only prayer is that now that he is in charge, Parliament is duly taken care of as you have been speaking about.

Mr Speaker, the 2021 Budget was themed “Won ya wo hie”, a Ga expression meaning we are moving forward. As we start our debate this afternoon, it would be important to note where we are coming from, collectively; where we are going,; and that which ought to be done to get us there collectively.

Mr Speaker, I say collectively because very often when it comes to Budget debates, the Majority side sees everything right with the economy and the Budget and the Minority side sees everything wrong with the economy and the Budget. But Mr Speaker, if I may quote from His Excellency the President's State of the Nation's Address as delivered on Tuesday, 9th March, 2021 on page 2, paragraph 3 it states as follows:

“This is what the Ghanaian people demand from us by insisting on virtual parity in the House between the two major parties of our country. The realisation of the Ghana Project, and not the attainment of narrow partisan interests, must be the guiding principle of the business to be conducted in the House.”

Mr Speaker, if I would refer you to paragraph 1144 of the Budget Statement itself, there is a statement made by the Minister responsible for Finance which says as follows:

“While we debate and we may disagree on issues, we should always be united on the broad goal of advancing the welfare and progress of our people. Principle beyond partisan politics in principle. There is more to us than we have so far realised.”

Mr Speaker, he then goes on with a quotation asking us to work together.

So Mr Speaker, as we start this debate, my prayer is that the common Ghanaian interest is what would guide the submissions that we make.

Mr Speaker, today, we are debating the principles of the Budget;
Mr Speaker, I would be speaking to just five issues 3:57 p.m.
first, a recap of how Ghana has made progress so far; second, a recap of what has challenged our progress; third, the need to recover to transform and fulfil the aspirations of our people; fourth, the Ghana CARES “Obaatanpa” Programme and finally, the future of what we can achieve, working together.
Mr Speaker, if we look at Chapter 6 of the 1992 Constitution, article 36, clause 1 3:57 p.m.
“The State shall take all necessary action to ensure that the national economy is managed in such a manner as to maximise the rate of economic development and to secure the maximum welfare, freedom and happiness of every person in Ghana and to provide adequate means of livelihood and suitable employment and public assistance to the needy.”
Mr Speaker, a cursory look at some of the benchmarks of our economic progress over the years shows that we have been responding to this imperative. If we take growth, one of the major measures of how our economy is picking up, we have moved from about 3.4 in 2016 to about 7.9 as at the end of 2019. In fact, non-oil GDP growth moved from 4.6 in 2016 to 5.8 at the end of 2019.
Mr Speaker, with inflation, we have successfully as a country brought down inflation from about 15.4 per cent in 2016 to 7.9 per cent in 2019.
Mr Speaker, the monetary policy rate by the Bank of Ghana dropped 25.5 per cent in 2016 down to 16.0 per cent at the end of 2019.
Mr Speaker, budget deficit was brought down to about 4.8 per cent in 2019. Primary balance from -1.1 moved to 0.8 between 2016 and
2019.
So Mr Speaker, on the face of the data set, the evidence is clear that we have been making progress as a country.
Mr Speaker, this progress is due to three major factors 3:57 p.m.
first, the economic leadership provided by the Executive branch of Government;
second, the strong checks and balances that this House exacts on the executive; and thirdly, the hard work of Ghanaians.
Mr Speaker, these are the things that have come together to uplift our economy albeit the few slippages that we have.
Mr Speaker, I know sometimes politicians as we are would like to deny this and question a few but the progress of Ghana is one that is well- known and accepted whether by the International Monetary Fund, International Ratings Agencies or by economists all over.
Mr Speaker 3:57 p.m.
The Hon First Deputy Speaker to take the Chair.
Sorry. Please, continue.
MR FIRST DEPUTY SPEAKER
Mr Oppong-Nkrumah 4:03 p.m.
What we ought to do is that while admitting that generally, we have made progress, focus on where our slippages have been and we see how to fix it, that is what brings me to the second item that I would want to speak about which is part of our challenges.
Mr Speaker, again, because we are dealing with the principles, we are connecting the Budget to the imperatives like the Constitution and our medium-term development framework.
Mr Speaker, article 34(2) of the 1992 Constitution says 4:03 p.m.
“The President shall report to Parliament at least once a year on the steps taken to ensure the realisation of the policy objectives contained in this Chapter; and in particular, the realisation of basic human rights, a healthy economy, the right to work, the right to good healthcare and the right to education.”
Mr Speaker, despite the fact that we have made progress as a country, we still have some challenges, one of the key challenges being the annual gap between revenues and expenditures which then translates into year-on-year deficit.
Mr Speaker, this House is well- accustomed to the history of how we have brought down deficits and even passed a Fiscal Responsibility Act aimed at ensuring that Ghana never again should be an ordinarily recurring basis going beyond 5 per cent of
GDP.
Mr Speaker, article 34(2) of the 1992 Constitution says 4:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, another challenge that we have had over the years is our high debt to GDP ratio which over the years we have tried to bring down. But in 2020, as we are all aware, we were hit by COVID-19 and COVID- 19 among other things has exacted huge burden on our economy.
Mr Speaker, paragraph 72 of the Budget speech as read by the Minister says among other things that the fiscal impact of COVID-19 was GH¢19.7 billion. If we add that to the cost of financial sector clean-up of GH¢21 billion, the cost of the excess capacity charges paid to Independent Power Producers (IPPs) of GH¢12 billion, we are spending some GH¢52 billion, especially at a time when our revenues have gone low.
Mr Speaker, in many parts of the world, as governments have done their best to provide for their citizens in hard times, the time is becoming clear to them that they need to introduce measures to raise revenues to close some of these gaps.
In the United States of America, for example, having passed a US$1.9 trillion support package, President Biden is examining, and it is expected he soon would pass some of the first major tax hikes since 1993 to help the economy close the gap between
what they have spent as a result of these challenges and what they ordinarily raised.
Mr Speaker, the reality is that when a nation is at war, citizens have to chip in so that we mobilise resources to win that war, which brings me to the third matter I would like to speak about which his recovery, transformation and the fulfilment of our aspirations.
Mr Speaker, we are at a point in our history where we have no other choice than to engineer a recovery of this economy. This economy that was growing at an average of about 6.9 or 7 per cent in the last three or four years now came down to about 0.9 per cent at least, in terms of target in 2020. We have no choice than to begin to engineer a recovery of this economy.
The Government has started its part by introducing a number of measures: first, vaccinating the population targeting about 20 million people by the end of this year so that full economic activities can resume and the kind of investment and stimulus into the various sectors can bring back that strong growth that we experienced. Government has also laid out a clear plan to invest in and
stimulate some specific sectors and this is what is captured in what we call the Ghana CARES “Obaatanpa” Programme.
Mr Speaker, I just want to highlight a few of the things that funds are to be invested in, in this Ghana CARES “Obaatanpa” Programme. Number one is food security.
Agriculture is a mainstay of our economy, and we need to continuously support our farmers because as the numbers have demonstrated in the last four years, when we supported our farmers, agriculture productivity increased and consequent to that jobs were created in that sector as well.
Mr Speaker, under this programme, we are expecting to extend support to about 1.5 million farmers and this includes support with fertilisers, seeds, extension officers from the about 1.2 that we believe has been done so far. We also expect to extend support to rice millers and poultry farmers and also support commercial farming in Ghana.
Mr Speaker, we expect also under this programme to provide support for businesses across this country.

Already, the National Board for Small-Scale Industries (NBSSI) has provided some GH¢500 million in terms of support to various parts of the Ghanaian economy. This needs to be stepped up as we stimulate and invest in more businesses and sectors of our economy.

Mr Speaker, it is clear that if we do not invest in our healthcare system, one pandemic can literally collapse our entire economy, and so there is the need to invest significantly in the healthcare system. Agenda 111 as the President has been speaking about is on the cart.

Additionally, we would want to fast-track digitisation and develop engineering machine tools and ICT industries. Mr Speaker, so the post COVID Economic Recovery Programme is one, that first of all requires us to come back from that fiscal deficit of about 11 per cent to 9 per cent this year, 7 per cent in the third year and back to the fiscal responsible limit of about 5 per cent by the year 2024.

Among other things, this post- COVID Economic Recovery Programme also focuses on ensuring that we bring back resounding growth in various sectors of the economy as
Mr First Deputy Speaker 4:07 p.m.
I will now call on the Hon Ranking Member for the Finance Committee, Mr Cassiel Ato Forson.
Mr Cassiel Ato Baah Forson (NDC -- Ajumako/Enyan/ Essiam) 4:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity to also contribute to the debate.
Mr Speaker, in doing so, let me put on record that an effective fiscal consolidation should always and everywhere lead to a reduced public debt to a sustainable limit. However, sadly, it is only in the case of Ghana that the Government claims that they are consolidating the fiscal for four years in a roll, yet, our public debt still increases at an increasing rate, at an unsustainable limit, and that is scary.
Mr Speaker, again, in the Budget Statement, references have been made that the Government has been undertaking fiscal consolidation since 2017 till the year 2020, when COVID-19 arrived.
Mr Cassiel Ato Baah Forson (NDC -- Ajumako/Enyan/ Essiam) 4:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, sadly, this deficit excludes the financial sector cost of an amount of GH¢8 billion. If we are to add the financial sector cost of an amount of GH¢8 billion, that would move us to an amount of 13.8 per cent of GDP.
However, strangely and to my surprise, an amount of GH¢ 6.2 billion being energy sector payment again is missing from the Budget Statement. So, the fiscal deficit is not an amount of 11.7 per cent of GDP, but it is in fact an amount of 15.3 per cent of GDP for the year 2020.
Mr Speaker, again, if we are to look at the Appendix 3(b) of the Budget Statement, we would notice that the Ministry responsible for Finance has provisioned that in the year 2020, they incurred arrears of an amount of GH¢3.2 billion. If we are to add these arrears to it, then we would notice that the fiscal deficit, including the financial sector and the energy sector payments, plus the arrears would be an amount of 17.5 per cent of GDP. So, it is about 17.5 per cent of GDP, which means that the financing that we needed for the year 2020 was an amount of GH¢67.3 billion, meaning that we added to our public debt, an amount of GH¢67.3 billion in one year. This, in my view, is something that we should send a strong signal to the Ministry of Finance about.
Mr Speaker, I would want to put it on record that we the Hon Members of Parliament on the Minority side of the House wish to send a strong message to the Minister responsible for Finance and the Ministry of Finance that until these anomalies are corrected, we would not be part of the passage of this Budget Statement.

Mr Speaker, these are critical issues because this is the way that we would be able to track the debt accumulation. Until we track the way we accumulate debt, and decide to tickle ourselves and create wrong impressions that the Government is consolidating, we would end up destroying the country that we have. That is why I call on you to ask the Hon Minister responsible for Finance to, as a matter of urgency, correct these anomalies in the Budget Statement.

Mr Speaker, it does not speak well of us. I have not seen any country where some expenditures are regarded as extraordinary, and then also, they are not captured in the fiscal table. Mr Speaker, I challenge the Hon Minister responsible for Finance to show me one country that has a fiscal table as messed up as we have contrary to international standards?

Mr Speaker, this is not allowed, and should not be accepted. Mr Speaker, that is why we find ourselves in a serious debt situation.

Oftentimes, we ask ourselves: how did we get to where we are? Why is it that public debt has increased so much that we cannot even control it? Mr Speaker, if you are to look at the debt profile, it speaks for itself.

You would notice that former President Atta Mills increased our public debt by GH¢26.2 billion; former President John Mahama increased it by GH¢84.3 billion. Within four years, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo increased our public debt by GH¢171.2 billion. This represents 60 per cent of our debt stock today.

Mr Speaker, I heard the Hon Majority Leader in Ho on Saturday making a strong argument that it does not matter how much you owe; what matters is whether you would be able to pay your debt. I will prove to you that today, Ghana is at the tipping edge. We are getting close to a level that we may not be able to pay our debts. Sadly, that is where we are getting to.

Mr Speaker, oftentimes, you hear arguments why advanced countries

like Japan, United States of America (USA) and the United Kingdom (UK) have huge debt in excess of 100 per cent of GDP. Our ability and theirs can never be the same. Mr Speaker, in the USA, the UK and most of the advanced countries, they do tax as a percentage to their GDP - 35 to 40 per cent. We are struggling to do 12 per cent, and we want to compare ourselves to them.

That is why we have a debt limit of 70 per cent, and so, our revenue is about three times what those countries achieve. While we can carry 70 per cent of debt to GDP, they can carry 210 per cent so, we cannot compare ourselves to those countries. Mr Speaker, that argument is moot, and we should stop making it. What we should be interested in is to make sure that just like our peers are doing, we stay within our means.

Mr Speaker, most importantly, any time you hear the case, then, our Hon Colleagues from the NPP say that the rate of debt accumulation has slowed down under their Administration. Let us not tickle ourselves. Rate of debt accumulation does not mean much; what it means simply is that we are comparing period 1 to 2 and to express it over the previous year. It is simple. So, anytime the denominator increases, then certainly, the rate of debt would slow down. This is
rose
Mr Forson 4:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, apart from that, the previous Administration took the public debt from 42.9 to 55.6 per cent of GDP. This represents eight per cent increase; we increased our debt by eight per cent.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 4:27 p.m.
Hon Ranking Member, kindly hold on.
Yes, Hon Deputy Majority Leader?
Mr Afenyo-Markin 4:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, Hon Ato Forson was once an Hon Deputy Minister for Finance. All his submission on the debt stock and the percentages are very misleading. This is a House of records. They inherited a debt of GH¢9.5 billion, and when they left Office, it was GH¢122 billion, which was over 1,200 per cent. Why then does he today create the impression to the world that a debt increase of 160 per cent is worse off? Their eight years was over 1,200 per cent. He was there as a Deputy Minister for Finance. Mr Speaker, that is very misleading.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 4:27 p.m.
Hon Leader, you said he was misleading the House so, I listened to see what it is he was misleading, but I do not --
Mr Afenyo-Markin 4:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, the context he placed his argument on was to the effect that there has been a worse management of the economy by way of increasing the debt stock. He said within four years, we have increased it by 160 per cent. That is wrong in the sense that they had eight years and they increased our debt stock by over 1,200 per cent. That is very misleading.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 4:27 p.m.
Hon Leader, thank you. You would get the opportunity to argue that.
Hon Ranking Member, please continue.
Mr Forson 4:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I hope you would take note of the interruptions and adjust the time appropriately.
Mr Speaker, in the year 2012, Ghana's public debt was 47.8 per cent of GDP. In the year 2013, former President Mahama reduced it to 42.5 per cent of GDP. Mr Speaker, this public debt subsequently increased to 51.9 per cent. By the end of 2016, it increased to 55.97 per cent of GDP, approximately 56 per cent of GDP.
In the year 2017, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo reduced the public debt from 56 to 55.56 per cent of GDP, but in the year 2018, it started going up to 57.58 per cent of GDP. This was before COVID-19. The public debt increased to 62.47 per cent of GDP. The situation got worse to 76 per cent of GDP.
Mr Speaker, as if that is not enough, one major way for us to assess as to whether we are in a position to repay our debt is to compare our debt to our revenue. That is the debt sustainability issues
we should be concerned about. Mr Speaker, I will give you some statistics.
If you were to compare our tax revenue to the debt service - debt service simply means interest payment and amortisation. Amortisation is the debt that we are paying; the principal amount you are paying. Mr Speaker, if we are to compare debt service to tax revenue, in the year 2013, we spent 39.28 per cent of our tax revenue to service our debt. This amount increased to 47.11 per cent in 2014; increased to 55.04 per cent in 2015. Mr Speaker, by the time we left Office, the ratio changed to 66.43 per cent of GDP.
Sadly, this Government then came to office and increased it to 88.9 per cent of GDP. Mr Speaker, this means that we have to spend approximately 90 per cent of all the taxes that we collect in this economy for the purposes of debt servicing. This is serious, and that is why I have tried to point to the fact that we should be careful because we are at the tipping edge.
Mr Speaker, again, if you are to take only the interest - interest is different from debt service in the sense that you are not paying principal so, we should be concerned about interest only. Mr Speaker, as of 2013,
Mr Forson 4:37 a.m.
in fact, we spent 33.1 per cent of our tax revenue for the purposes of paying interest.

This amount increased to 47.48 per cent in the year 2016. Today, we have to spend 55.34 per cent of our tax revenue for the purposes of paying interest in the year 2020.

Mr Speaker, before COVID-19, this amount was 46.22 per cent in the year 2019, so how can anybody just turn around and blame COVID-19? The problem is not COVID-19 but mismanagement. It is their mismanagement that has created the mess and they cannot blame it on

COVID-19.

Again, on sustainability issues, if Ghana is to take all our exports and express it as a percentage to our external debt, the component of the debt that we would certainly pay to our foreign investors - If you are to take timber, cocoa, gold, petroleum, oil and the pineapples, et cetera that we export, the problem we have here under President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is that the amount is not enough to even pay for our external component of the debt.

Mr Speaker, we would need 70 per cent more of our exports to service that debt and they are telling me that it does not matter and they can just go ahead and borrow. We are getting to a level that if care is not taken, we cannot service our debts.

As if that is not enough, let us now compare the interest that we pay and then show it as a ratio on capital expenditure. One reason this is extremely important is that oftentimes, we complain about economic growth. There is the need for us to smoothen our economic growth over the period. That is why our scarce resources are deployed in such a way that it would benefit the key sectors of the economy.

Mr Speaker, today, we are confronted in a situation where we raised so much revenue but end up using the entire revenue for the purposes of paying interest. This is because we borrowed too much and failed to smoothen. The mismanage- ment has continued since 2018. Clearly, in the year 2017, they needed two and a half times of their interest payments to be able to only pay for capital expenditure.

In the year, 2018, this amount increased. Capital expenditure is three times of our interest payments. Again, in the year 2019, the situation got

worse at almost four times before we could pay our interest. So, you can see the mismatch in the economy. It is no wonder we are where we are today.

Mr Speaker, on the issue of debt sustainability, let no one create the impression that Ghana as a country is in a position to service our debts, so we should continue borrowing. Accidents can happen and I say this because if you are confronted with a situation where you spend approximately 90 per cent of your tax revenue for the purposes of servicing your debt, you should be worried about it.

Our debt has gotten to a level that it could end up slowing economic growth to a sustainable limit and that is what we should be worried about. That is why today, we are confronted with a situation of Government saddling us with public debt to the extent that now we have to pay. So, the option is that Ghanaians must pay in the form of taxes.

Mr Speaker, today, they have introduced taxes that all of us are worried about. The ordinary Ghanaian is complaining because the taxes are so harsh. They have now decided to introduce a COVID-19 tax. They have decided to increase

the National Health Insurance Levy from two and a half per cent to three and a half per cent. The informal sector that used to pay three per cent VAT flat rate, has seen it increased to four per cent. This is not fair. The informal sector should not be the one to carry the Government's mismanagement. The informal sector rather needs support and not additional taxes.

Mr Speaker, this Government is insensitive and this Budget is nothing but a bitter Budget. This is a Budget that does not seemed to care, a Budget that is only imposing taxes. We have taxes from heaven to hell. Since I was born as a Ghanaian, I have never seen a Budget with these many taxes. [Interruption] The taxes are so much. Since Dr Kwame Nkrumah went to Guinea, we have not seen taxes like these. This is dangerous.

Mr Speaker, if I may give this Budget a name, it is “Kofie Kowu” Budget, that is “Go Home and Die” Budget. The Government does not seem to care, and that is why I am saying we should be careful with some of these taxes. The worst one has to do with an increase of five per cent additional tax on the financial sector.

Mr Speaker, the financial sector is about to recover. Remember, we have already imposed the National
Mr First Deputy Speaker 4:37 a.m.
Hon Member, one more minute.
Mr Forson 4:37 a.m.
Mr Speaker, that is why I can assure you that I will not be part of the approval of this Budget until those misreporting issues have been set.
Mrs Abena Osei-Asare (NPP -- Atiwa East) 4:47 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity.
Before I go on, I just want to clear the issue of misreporting that my Hon Colleague on the other Side has just stated. Firstly, the data we present to the people of Ghana and the international community is valid and credible. This is because we always show the deficit with the financial sector bailout and the energy sector bailout and then we show the deficit without it. Included in our debt is the financial sector bailout and the energy sector bailout.
Mr Speaker, this is unprecedented. When last year, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, we had to go

Mr Speaker, when they had to go for a bailout in 2015, of less than US$1 billion, IMF gave them conditions to fulfil which they even failed to fulfil. So, we always present accurate data to the people of Ghana and the IMF as well, otherwise, they would not have gone ahead to give us US$1 billion when we needed it in just three weeks.

Mr Speaker, again, my Hon Colleague on the other Side said that our debt to GDP ratio has risen. When we check the analysis from 2017 to 2019, we did a debt to GDP ratio of below 65 per cent which include the financial sector bail out and for the energy sector bailout, we did 62.5 per cent which is way below the 65 per cent we set for ourselves and the ECOWAS target of 70 per cent and then the COVID-19 pandemic hits us. So, we moved from 62.5 per cent to 76 per cent as a result of the extra expenditures that we had to incur and the revision in our revenues as a result of the lockdown and the other

adverse effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mr Speaker, my Hon Colleague on the other Side also said that we have used more than 70 per cent of our tax revenue to service interest. It is not 70 per cent but 50 per cent if it is the total revenue and if it is the tax revenue, it is 62 per cent. In 2013, they used 72 per cent of revenue to pay for just compensation.

Mr Speaker, I thank the Government for the great job it did to support the citizens during the trying period of a global pandemic for unprecedented proportion which has transformed into an economic crisis for not just Ghana alone but the whole world.

The IMF projected that the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic would see global debt rise by 98 per cent, deficits would go up, there would be contraction in growth by 3.8 per cent and even in the sub-Saharan Africa, a negative growth was predicted. Yet within these challenges, Ghana has within the past year seen a positive growth in virtually all the sectors except the industry.

Mr Speaker, we have come through with a projected positive end of year outlook of 0.9 per cent growth of GDP. The agricultural sector grew by 4.5 per cent, thanks to the Government for Planting for Food and
Mr Isaac Adongo (NDC -- Bolgatanga Central) 4:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I thank you.
Mr Speaker, before I start with my submission, I would want to make it clear that the US$1 billion that was
given to Ghana was called the “Rapid Credit Facility''.

“Rapid'' because it can be done in five days and so, if they did it in three weeks, they know why it was so. Other countries did it in 10 days because it is a Rapid Credit Facility with modification to accommodate the exigencies of the time. So, if they did it in three weeks, some people's turnaround time was just one week.

Mr Speaker, the Budget Statement as was read, particularly, considering the circumstances we find ourselves in and looking through the measures that have been undertaken across the globe to revive various economies that are challenged by the COVID-19 pandemic, we found out that Ghana was the only country that introduced austerity in the midst of the pandemic. I have never seen a country trying to revive from the pandemic that wants to introduce austerity measures and so hope that they will be able to get out of the pandemic.

As a matter of fact, the measures being introduced will plunge us deeper into the pandemic and our recovery will be more painful and as well take longer to achieve.

Mr Speaker, the Hon Ranking Member on the Finance Committee has spoken extensively about the Budget deficit. However, the Budget deficit and the manipulations over the years have always been my pet subject when the Budget Statement is read on the Floor. Today, I intend to demonstrate that our Budget deficit has been massaged by GH¢25 billion.

Mr Speaker, the Hon Minister for Finance reported that our foreign financing of the Budget deficit was only GH¢31million and nothing more, nothing less. If we look at the Budget Statement, particularly, under APPENDIX 2A which we find at page 205 it makes it clear that the loans that we contracted for our projects which we call; ‘project loans' amounted to about GH¢6 billion.

Mr Speaker, ‘project loans' cannot be used to amortise loans. They must be spent on specific projects and there is no way we can reduce our deficit financing by using that to pay. So, GH¢6 billion unequivocal amount of money cannot be found there.

There are also programme loans and I was very sad to see a Report in the Budget Statement that says that our programme loans were only GH¢388 million.

Mr Speaker, in the Hon Minister's own document, and here, I refer to APPENDIX 12B; Performance Summary of Funding Sources which can be found under page 275. This page lists all the programme loans contracted and spent in the year and this is by the Hon Minister. It says: ‘we got an amount of US$1.3 billion from IPF and African Development Bank out of which we spent GH¢512 million. We also got another US$65 million which amounted to GH¢377million out of which we spent GH¢343 million. There is also a fast- track COVID-19 facility of about US$130 million from the World Bank and that amount was entirely spent and it is about GH¢754 million. It also says that the IMF gave us the equivalent of GH¢5,852,950,000.00, out of which we spent GH¢5,566,686,281.54. Again, it says, the African Development Bank (AfDB) also gave us GH¢405,650,000.00 out of which we spent GH¢389,678,850.00.

Mr Speaker, the Hon Minister says, the European Union (EU) also gave us GH¢504,000,000.00 and the entire amount has been spent. How can we be told that all we got after all these amounts put together was only GH¢388 million? I cannot imagine this and this is a House of record and I do not know who did that to my
Mr Isaac Adongo (NDC -- Bolgatanga Central) 5:07 p.m.
senior Hon Colleague to come to the House to read this to us.
If we put all these figures together; from the programme of loans that the Hon Minister himself reported, it is GH¢7.5 billion and that money has disappeared from our deficits and we are now dealing with GH¢388 million which creates a kwashiorkor amount of GH¢31 million of foreign financing of our public debt. That cannot be the case
Mr Speaker, we are also aware that this House approved US$3 billion out of which we said that US$2 billion of the Eurobond money should be spent on the Budget. They indicated in their Report that they had spent all that money and yet, they say that the US$2 billion is worth GH¢7.5 billion. What exchange rate generates that amount?
The exchange rate they used gives us our Eurobond utilisation on the Budget at 11.590 billion. If we put all that together, our foreign financing of the Budget comes to an amount of GH¢25, 155 billion and not 31million. If we add that to our domestic financing of the Budget of 45 billion, we have a deficit of GH¢70.798 billion. This excludes the matters that my Hon Colleague raised regarding off balance sheet items; these are real
cash that was collected and spent for which they have actually reported in certain aspects of the Budget but where it mattered most, it disappeared. The Budget deficit effectively comes to 18.6 billion on a cash basis without adding below or above the line or a middle line, it comes to 18.6 billion. How can they look us in the face and do this to us?
Mr Speaker, what this means is that total expenditure which is about GH¢25 billion has completely disappeared from our expenditure framework and these are expenditures relating to the COVID-19 pandemic. The whole world is worried about transparency on the utilisation of donor funds that came to fight the pandemic. They are not even accounting for the moneys spent but they are increasing taxes. These are very dangerous times for the people of Ghana and we cannot continue on this path. This financing engineering must stop and this House must insist that the right things are done in order to get credibility for the political class of our country.
Mr Speaker, somebody will tell you that some of the moneys were used for amortisation. This House approved an amount for amortisation; US$1billion and the Hon Minister himself explains in paragraph 165 on page 38, that out of the Eurobond money, about 523 billion was used to
buy back the 2023 issuance and about 476 billion of the remaining amount was spent on domestic liability management and that exhausts the US$1billion. However, in the Budget Statement, when it comes to deficit, they report amortisation of GH¢14 billion in order to sweep off the moneys they spent from borrowing.
How can US$1billion metamor- phose into GH¢14 billion? That cannot happen and this is the kind of gerrymandering that we are facing and this is what they use to become better managers of the economy? They are better manipulators of the economy.
Mr Speaker, I would like to make the point that the Hon Minister also reports on our public debt. Again, I would like to say that our public debt was conspicuously understated by the records of this House and I will prove it here. If we look at APPENDIX 10B, it shows a schedule that has been provided to this House and it lists all the financial commitments or loans borrowed this year. On pages 249 and 250, the Budget Statement reads: “APPENDIX 10B: NEW
COMMITMENTS IN 2020”.
These are additional loans we borrowed in the year 2020, some of which were drawn down just like the Eurobonds that were drawn down
and spent and should go into our debt. The matters being referred to regards the COVID-19 expenditure programme loans and these are all conspicuously missing in this Appendix which is talking about our new loans.

Even if they want to play dariga with Ghanaians, can they play dariga with US$1 billion rapid credit facility from IMF? How can they delete that figure from the list of commitments? Mr Speaker, all the other items that I raised; European Union spending, the money from African Development Bank and the money from the World Bank are all conspicuously missing from our debt profile.

Mr Speaker, so an amount equivalent to GH¢7.5 billion has been shaved off our public debt. If we add these numbers then our public debt is now GH¢299 billion and it is threatening to hit GH¢300 billion and this gives us a debt to GPD of 78 per cent. So, they should not be roaming around with 76 per cent because it does not exist. What we owe and the debt to GDP is 78 per cent.

Mr Speaker, I listened to the venerable Hon Leader trying strenuously to explain that if they remove the financial sector bailout
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:07 p.m.
Hon Member, your time is up. I gave you the sign and I am sure you know.
Mr I. Adongo 5:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, some people had more time than they can write and others can write more than the time.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:07 p.m.
Hon Member, share what you have with others so that you do not run out of time.
Mr I. Adongo 5:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you very much.
Mr Speaker, another policy deception is roads --
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:07 p.m.
Hon Member, your time is up and you are introducing another point. I thought you were concluding? Your 15 minutes is up.
Mr I. Adongo 5:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, in conclusion, they are budgeting only GH¢90 million for sanitation meanwhile they want to collect GH¢311 million from us as Borla taxes. It means the money is not meant for Borla.
Mr Speaker, I come from a place where they keep telling us they would construct the Pwalugu Dam but they have only budgeted 42 billion for that dam. What type of Dam can they build with 42 billion? Out of a project that is worth --
Mr Kwaku A. Kwarteng (NPP -- Obuasi West) 5:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you.
Mr Speaker, before I make my contribution it is important that we
Mr Kwaku A. Kwarteng (NPP -- Obuasi West) 5:07 p.m.


If he would get information on disbursed portions of our credits then he would see that the figures as have been presented in the Budget Statement are accurate.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:07 p.m.
Hon Kwarteng, hold on.
Mr I. Adongo 5:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, this is the Hon Minister's own document and he is talking about disbursement. I was talking about disbursement and not commitment.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:07 p.m.
Hon Member, please proceed?
Mr Kwarteng 5:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, the point I made to Hon Adongo is that I listened to the figures he added which resulted in what he said ought to be our debt figure. I am telling him that those figures represent the loan
amounts and if he would add the disbursement as presented in the Budget Statement, then there is no way he would arrive at his figure. So, he should please stop that because there are students who are monitoring this debate so it is important for us to teach them the right things.
Again, we have heard about deficits and that as a Government, we have been hiding some of the expenditures so that we would not present the true deficits. Mr Speaker, the important thing is for the information to be presented to the stakeholders in the economy. So, if we present a deficit and for instance say that it excludes, for instance, the financial sector clean-up commitments, so long as we provide that information, one cannot say that anybody is attempting to mislead.

Again, that is something that has been repeated here again and again. Mr Speaker, we should put a stop to that.

Hon Adongo referred to our Gross International Reserves and said that is not for us. But if one would want to understand the need and the significance of our Gross Reserves, he would need to look at the behaviour of the cedi against trading partners. I

can tell you that from 2000 to date, the best performance of the cedi has been in the last four years. In particular, the cedi performed so well against the major currencies in the year 2020. So what is the debate about Gross International Reserves? We must look at the interface between economic management and the welfare of the people, and where it matters is the exchange rate that affects prices on the market.

Mr Speaker, the year 2020, as has been indicated, was a year like no other. And we all saw how a pandemic descended on us, took away lives, disrupted businesses and destroyed livelihoods. All Governments, including that of Ghana, were confronted with the need to find money to finance, not just the gap arising out of the revenue shortfalls but also, the additional expenditure that the pandemic brought in its wake.

Mr Speaker, in the case of Ghana, we want to know how we performed within the consideration that we need to keep our debts within sustainable limits to make the recovery easier and less painful. The debt figures that were produced by Hon Ato Forson were that which did not reflect the size of the economy. Also the growth in public debt is important in the year

that we needed to fund these loans. All the facilities he mentioned were loans, yet we were able to keep the growth of our public debt lower than in previous years. This means we have done something right. And the burden is on us as a country to look at the strategies that made this possible and to improve for even better outcomes. The attempt to make it look like in the wake of the pandemic somehow Government has borrowed beyond what we should have, is just not right.

Mr Speaker, it was not just in terms of the debt. While in my opinion, we managed to keep that within sustainable limits, Government took pains to preserve all the social services that we had committed to the people; the National Strategic COVID-19 Response Programme was preserved in 2020 and would be preserved in 2021; Free SHS preserved; Year of Roads preserved; One District, One Modern Hospital preserved; Teacher trainee allowances preserved; Nursing training allowances preserved; One District, One Factory preserved; Planting for Food and Jobs preserved; the Nations Builders Corps (NABCO) Programme preserved; School Feeding Programme preserved; Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) Programme preserved; and Pensions Reforms preserved. [Hear!
Mr John A. Jinapor (NDC -- Yapei/Kusawgu) 5:27 p.m.
Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. Let me thank you for the opportunity. [Interruption]
Mr Speaker, I heard my senior colleague say that I should not be diabolic, and so I would start on a good note.
I would want to associate myself with the Statement by the Speaker of Parliament in respect of the way Parliament is treated by the Executive. This is akin to two people. Like Hon Bagbin said, he and President Akufo- Addo worked together. Now there is some kontomire stew with some ampesi and a bit of palm oil on it, and what President Akufo-Addo is doing under the guise of taking a bit of the stew, has created a canal towards his side so that all the palm oil would gravitate towards his side. It is on this note that we would want to serve notice that we would not be part of
this today and would not be part of it tomorrow.
Mr Speaker, on a more substantive issue, the economic management is not just about growing GDP. And so even as a Parliament, I think that we must begin to look at other ways of measuring progress in terms of the welfare of the people. You can grow your economy; your GDP can grow and yet it would be a jobless GDP growth.
Mr Speaker, if you borrow or take money and all you do is to spend on recurrent expenditure to the detriment of capital expenditure, you might initially see some growth because of the expenditure approach, but eventually, your GDP cannot generate the needed revenue for you, like we are witnessing today. There has been an attempt to blame the current hardship, quagmire and difficulty that we find ourselves on COVID-19.
Mr Speaker, I therefore want to deal with pre-COVID-19; between 2017 and 2019. In 2016, our total tax revenue was GH¢25.7 billion. Out of that amount, our debt servicing was GH¢9 billion. What it meant is that, we needed 35 per cent of our tax revenue, which is the first line item as an economist, to pay for that debt.
Mr Speaker, in 2019, the year that they claimed they did well, our tax revenue was GH¢42 billion and our interest payment ballooned to GH¢20 billion. It means that if you get your tax revenue from 38 per cent, we have moved to 48 per cent. I am not talking about nominal figures; I am talking about percentages.
Mr Speaker, if you took compensations and debt servicing, in 2016, our tax revenue could pay the two items and we will still be left with some money because compensation was GH¢14 billion. If you add it to the GH¢19 billion, it makes it GH¢23 billion. So out of GH¢25.7 billion, we still had about GH¢4 billion extra. By the end of 2019, compensation and interest payment amounted to GH¢43 billion. So if you took GH¢42 billion, you simply could not pay for compensation and interest at the same time.
So this issue of COVID-19 is neither here nor there. What COVID- 19 has only done is to confirm the poor state of the Ghanaian economy which was hidden in terms of figures. This is because, if your Debt to GDP is growing at a slow pace, and your GDP is growing at a faster pace, and if your deficit that becomes the loans and debts are around 5 per cent, how
come today, we have a Debt to GDP of above 76 per cent?
It tells us that they are cooking figures. This is basic economics because if one's deficits are low, your debt accumulation is low, your GDP Growth Rate is high, then your Debt as a percentage of the GDP, which is the base, must be low. What we are seeing defies logic economics and cannot stand the test of time.

Mr Speaker, even with this, let us look at the two Administrations. From 2016, our total revenue was GH¢109 billion. By 2020, the revenue was around GH¢200 billion for President Akufo-Addo. ESLA revenues alone, former President Mahama got GH¢3 billion, while President Akufo-Addo got about GH¢12 billion.

Mr Speaker, since we started accumulating petroleum revenues from President Atta-Mills, President Mahama to President Akufo-Addo, President Akufo-Addo alone accounts for about 67 per cent of the total petroleum revenues that this country has got.

Mr Speaker, as if that is not enough, if we take Eurobond, which is a sovereign bond, President Mahama, President Atta-Mills and President Kufuor borrowed US$4.5
Mrs Osei-Asare 5:27 p.m.
On a point of Order. Mr Speaker, my friend on the
other Side is misleading the House. Ministry of Finance has not held 2 billion of Road Funds money. That cannot be true. This House is a House of records. The Ministry of Finance has contributed outside their regular funds to enable them pay more contractors. So what my friend on the other Side is saying is not true.
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
Mr J. A. Jinapor 5:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I refer to the Energy Sector Levies Act Account presented to this House. It is a public document. Because of the law we passed, it enabled the Minister for Finance to return some portions of the money. What they did was that the amount that went into the Road Fund was kept. The Minister can check. The record is here --
Annual Report on the Management of the Energy Sector Levies and Accounts for the Year, 2018; Submitted to Parliament by Ken Ofori-Atta, Minister for Finance.
Mr Speaker, we have debated this matter here. Hon Kwame Agbodza raised this matter right in this Chamber and even at the Committee level. We advised them that they should exempt them from the capping and re- alignment so that their money can be given to them. I would beg the Hon Minister to kindly look at the record.
Mr Speaker, as if that is not enough, if they look at what they can
achieve -- because in all this if a landlord or a family head gets money, he must be able to point to something. At least, we built the Ridge Hospital, did we not?
Some Hon Members 5:27 p.m.
We did!
We built the Ho Airport, did we not?
Some Hon Members 5:27 p.m.
We did!
We built the Kejetia Market, did we not?
Some Hon Members 5:27 p.m.
We did!
We built the Kotoka International Airport, did we not?
Some Hon Members 5:27 p.m.
We did!
We built the Tamale Airport, did we not?
Some Hon Members 5:27 p.m.
We did!
We built the Circle Interchange, did we not?
Some Hon Members 5:27 p.m.
We did!

Mr Speaker, the only thing he can boast of is a limping Free SHS with traffic light of blue, green, yellow, red and whatever we want to call it.
Some Hon Members 5:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, this is a President who has told us that the Zongo Development Fund has done so well that he has decided to abolish that Ministry. That the Special Development Ministry has done unprecedented work in the history of this country so the only way to thank them is to abolish that Ministry. What kind of Kwaku Ananse story is this?
Mr Speaker, this cannot stand the test of time. But apart from those that I have mentioned, they should go to the critical sectors of the economy. This is because when expenditures are made, it must reflect in the critical sectors of the economy. One key critical sector is the construction sector.
In 2016, under President Mahama, 8.4 per cent growth. Under President Akufo-Addo in 2019, -4.4 per cent growth. Despite all the issues about 1D1F, President Mahama, 7.9 per cent, President Akufo-Addo, 6.3 per cent. In 2016, the currency depreciated at 9.6 per cent. In 2019, their best year, the currency depreciated at 12.9 per cent. We were growing the financial sector at 8 per cent. Under them, in 2019, it is 1.8 per cent. Private sector growth, 14 per cent to 12 per cent. We took access to electricity from 54 per cent to 83 per cent. President Akufo- Addo took it from 83 per cent to 85
per cent. So every year, 0.5 per cent growth. That is his record.
Mr Speaker, in all these, after mismanaging the economy, and dissipating our public funds, he has come again with this Budget to increase NHIS levy from 2.5 to 3.5 per cent; increase VAT from 3 to 4 per cent. What he calls sanitation levy; 10 per cent on diesel, 10 per cent on petrol; another 20 per cent on diesel; another 20 per cent on petrol and then he is going to the financial sector to tax them 5 per cent. Profit before tax.
Mr Speaker, let me serve notice that these taxes, as far as the Minority is concerned, we would not be part of this illegitimate, illegal and callous taxes on the people of Ghana -- [Hear! Hear!] -- We would not be part of that. COVID-19 is still with us. In December, they were boasting that they were giving freebies.

What has changed between December, 2020 and now? Is COVID over? Why do they want to impoverish the ordinary Ghanaian?

Mr Speaker, the final one because of time. The Hon Minister said that he has spent GH¢12.5 billion on capacity charges. I have in my hand the 2020 Mid-Year Review Budget. With your permission, I would refer to paragraph 13 on page 2:

“We have spent in excess of GH¢4.7 billion in three and a half years.”

Then in six months, he wants to tell us that he has paid GH¢7.2 billion in six months.

Mr Speaker, this is the Budget Statement, I have combed through the Appendixes and the whole Budget and this GH¢7.2 billion cannot be found in the Budget.

Mr Speaker, if you want to catch a thief -- excuse my language -- there is a very clever way --
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:37 p.m.
Hon Member, you have one minute more.
Mr J. A. Jinapor 5:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, we told the Hon Minister that he should give us the breakdown of the so-called excess capacity he talked about. This is a public document, which is supposed to be the breakdown for that capacity charge.

Mr Speaker, Stratcon Energy Ghana was paid GH¢633 million for

fuel supply. GNPC was paid GH¢86 million as refund for heavy fuel oil. I would therefore wish to put on record that these so-called capacity charges are figment on the imagination of the current Administration and it cannot stand the test of time.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:37 p.m.
Yes, Hon Dr Nana Ayew Afriye?
Dr Nana Ayew Afriye (NPP -- Effiduase/Asokore) 5:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you.

Mr Speaker, it is sad when we compare one regime to another that spent eight years --
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:37 p.m.
Hon Dr Ayew Afriye, kindly wear your mask -- I ignored Hon Kweku Kwarteng because I know he had a speech challenge.
Dr Afriye 5:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, it is worrying when the eight years achievements of a regime is compared to the four years of work of the NPP. The Hon Member spoke about the Greater Accra Regional Hospital and some of those capital investments. I do not want to go
Mr Speaker, I would go ahead to read the comment on the Citi FM site. It says 5:37 p.m.
“According to him, there is an outstanding debt of some GH¢4.5 billion, which needs to be settled, hence Government's decision to introduce the new energy sector levy. The levy has caused an increase in petroleum prices by up to 27 per cent, compounding the effects of recent increases in utility tariffs. In an interview with Citi news, after a meeting with the Organised Labour over the tariffs
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:37 p.m.
Hon Member, you have one more minute.
Dr Afriye 5:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, in conclusion, we need roads, so, the toll increase is appropriate. If it is going to be by a measure that would attract private investors to build and to maintain our roads, this is the time. We would need to be frank with ourselves. I need a lot of roads in Effiduase/Asokore, and I am not even getting them. So, if this would indeed generate an amount of money that we would all see and know how it was applied, then we would need to support it.
Mr Speaker, there is one person on the Minority side, the Hon Rockson Nelson Dafeamekpor, who
always says that if we would have to increase road toll to be able to service our roads, maintain and to build them, then for him, he would never do politics with it. On this note, I am asking that we do not do politics for today, but we should move together under this recession and come out as one. Politics is there for 2021 --
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:37 p.m.
I would now call on the Hon Eric Opoku.
Mr Eric Opoku (NDC -- Asunafo South) 5:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I thank you very much.
Mr Speaker, before I start my contribution, I would like to draw the attention of the Hon Minister responsible for Finance to paragraph 242 of the budget statement, even before we get to appropriation because interesting times are ahead of us.
Mr Speaker, it is provided that the Office of the Special Prosecutor has engaged just two people, but the budget for the two people is an amount of GH¢43.473,043. This indicates that every month, each of the two would receive a salary close to GH¢2 million. This would affect the appropriation, so, the Finance

Mr Speaker, the President, in the State of the Nation Address, stated emphatically, with your indulgence I would like to read. He said: “We have, for the first time in a long while, become a net exporter of food”, but in paragraph 401 of his own Budget Statement, he said something different. With your permission, I read:

“The subsequent engagement with the stakeholders strengthened our determination to ensure we become net exporters on safer routes.”

The President said in one breath that Ghana is a net exporter of food and in another, he talked about determination to become a net exporter. A determination has not been realised yet, and that is the issue.

Mr Speaker, the second point has to do with the fact that if we increase petroleum related taxes, we must understand that the cost of food production would go up; the cost of transporting food would also go up, and eventually, food prices would rise. This Budget Statement is to impoverish the ordinary Ghanaian because food prices would go up.
Mr Speaker, what is most interesting is this 5:57 p.m.
in the same paragraph 394, it is stated that Ghana spends over GH¢1.5 billion to import 960,993 metric tonnes of rice every year. It is almost a million tonnes. [Interruption] That is what is stated in the Budget Statement, but the fact is that, Ghana consumes around 1.3
rose
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:57 p.m.
Hon Member, hold on. Switch off your microphone so you do not lose time.
Mr Addo 5:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I am up on a point of correction. My good Friend, the Hon Eric Opoku, quoted something in paragraph 394 of the Budget Statement to the extent that GH¢1.5 billion was used a year to import 960,993 metric tonnes of rice between 2017 and 2019. I believe it is a three year span. [Interruption] It is not every year that the GH¢1.5 billion was used to import rice.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:57 p.m.
So your point is that he has compounded what should be categorised together. Is that right?
Mr Addo 5:57 p.m.
Yes, that is it.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 5:57 p.m.
Very well. Hon Member, take note.
Mr Eric Opoku 6:07 a.m.
Mr Speaker, with your indulgence, I would like to read paragraph 394.
“Mr Speaker, the sobering fact is that despite significant strives, we still spend on average, GH¢1.5 billion a year to import 960,993 metric tonnes between 2017 and 2019.”
You do not understand. It means that every year, Government spends GH¢1.5 billion to import 950,993 and I am saying that the total consumption is estimated around 1.3 million metric tonnes. So, if you are importing 960,993, then it means that the local production of rice is just 20 per cent. You are importing almost 80 per cent of the rice that you consume from outside Ghana. That is why we have serious challenges in respect of exchange rates.
So, when they talk about planting for food, having increased production -- they have implemented this programme for almost four years and are reporting to this House that over the period, they have produced just 20 per cent of the rice consumed in this country. This is their own reporting.
Mr Speaker, when you go to paragraph 604 of the 2021 Budget --
rose
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:07 a.m.
Hon Member, kindly hold on.
Hon Deputy Majority Leader?
Mr Afenyo-Markin 6:07 a.m.
Mr Speaker, Hon Eric Opoku is in breach of the rules of debate of this House. The use of the word “dishonest reportage” -- My Hon Colleague is all right to disagree, but to say that there is dishonesty in official figures reported -- Let us be fair to Government and state agencies. He has been in a Government before and a Minister as well. He should express his disagreement.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:07 a.m.
Hon Deputy Majority Leader, point to me in the Standing Orders where --?
Mr Afenyo-Markin 6:07 a.m.
Mr Speaker, he said that in the Budget, a figure was quoted in dollars on the importation of rice. He said that he has found it somewhere in cedis. Where he found it, he has not tabled that document here. That source of his data which is in cedis is not part of our records, but we have the Budget here. I am saying that he can express his disagreement since he is in opposition and it is his right.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:07 a.m.
I thought you were complaining about the use of the word “dishonest”.
Mr Afenyo-Markin 6:07 a.m.
Yes, Mr Speaker. He said that it has been captured somewhere in cedis and in the Budget, it is dollars, so it is dishonest. That is where I think -
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:07 a.m.
All right. So, which specific Standing Order are you referring to?
Mr Afenyo-Markin 6:07 a.m.
Mr Speaker, you know I would always come fortified. It is Standing Order 30 (d). It reads:
“presenting to Parliament frivolous, false, scandalous, groundless or fabricated documents or such allegations in a petition”.
Mr Speaker, to the extent that he contends that Government is being dishonest, he is scandalising Government. He cannot --
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:07 a.m.
Hon Member, I disagree with you. Yes, content of speeches under Standing Order 93 will catch him in the use of “dishonesty” but not Standing Order 30. I disagree with Standing Order
30.
Hon Member, please withdraw the reference?
Mr E. Opoku 6:07 a.m.
Mr Speaker, while preparing for this debate, I decided to go through the Hansard but unfortunately, I do not have that copy here. I chanced upon one of the Hansards of this House in which your good Self used the words “dishonesty” and “political chickenery”, referring to --
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:07 a.m.
Hon Eric Opoku, my direction is to withdraw.
Mr E. Opoku 6:07 a.m.
Mr Speaker, I withdraw. To say that Hon Afenyo- Markin is engaged in political chickenery is like carrying coal to Newcastle. The fact is that I have referred to a document in which the President of the Republic of Ghana, speaking to this nation, alluded to the fact that we spend over US$1 billion on the importation of rice into this country.
Then there is another document in which the Minister for Agriculture indicated that we spend US$1.5 billion every year to import rice into this country in just December 2019. Now, the report in our Budget has GH¢1.4 billion, yet he is saying that I am not being fair.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:07 a.m.
I would direct you to use “inconsistent records”.
Mr E. Opoku 6:07 a.m.
Mr Speaker, I take a cue.
On paragraph 605, we are told that as a result of the interventions that Government made, the per hectare yield of rice increased by 59 per cent. However, when they aggregated the whole figure into the national output, they are saying that rice production increased from 30 per cent in 2016 to 50 per cent.
Mr Speaker, if the per capita yield increases, it must reflect in the aggregation. So, if the per capita yield increased by 59 per cent, we should expect the total output to also increase by the same 59 per cent. However, the per capita yield has increased by 59 per cent but the national output has increased by 20 per cent. What does that mean and how do you reconcile the two? It does not make sense. These are some of the issues that we raised.
Let me quickly touch on fisheries. We are told that the fisheries sector grew by 11 per cent. This is surprising. We cannot even know what caused the fisheries sector to --
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:07 a.m.
Hon Member, your time is up. Kindly conclude.
Mr E. Opoku 6:07 a.m.
Mr Speaker, my conclusion is that when you look at the three subsectors of the fisheries sector, production is declining in the marine subsector, the inland subsector and in the aquaculture subsector production is at 76,000 metric tonnes in 2018. In 2020, it is doing 64,000 and we are saying that because of that 64,000, we have registered an 11 per cent growth.
Mr Speaker, this can never be explained anywhere and that is why they cleverly decided not to provide production levels for the marine and inland sectors. So, just the aquaculture sector from 52 per cent to 64 per cent, they said that 11 per cent. That cannot be substantiated.
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:07 a.m.
Hon Collins Adomako-Mensah?
Mr Collins Adomako-Mensah (NPP -- Afigya Kwabre North) 6:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to contribute to the debate.
My senior Brother, Hon John Jinapor sought to do a comparison among the Presidents within the Fourth Republic. What he failed to say

Mr Speaker, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) reports on employment in the midst of this COVID-19 period, that close to about 114 million people lost their jobs. Most of these people are very youthful. However, I believe Ghana is in a better place to recover from this pandemic because even before the pandemic, H. E Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and his Government had commenced initiatives to address this issue.

Mr Speaker, I believe very strongly that there has never been a deliberate and well thought through programme which is aimed at developing our industry than the 1D1F programme. In 2016 when the NDC led Government read the last Budget Statement, and it is my hope that it would be their last - on page 472 of their Budget Statement, there was just one-line mention of the Komenda Sugar Factory, and it was so because there was none other factory to be talked about. I am proud to announce
Mr George Kwaku Ricketts- Hagan (NDC -- Cape Coast South) 6:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity to contribute to the Motion.
Mr Speaker, in doing so, I would like to point to some inaccuracies and misconceptions in the Government's micro economics and fiscal numbers. The whole world was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic but some countries did better than others. There were two crises; the health and economic crisis. Countries which had prepared well with well-built health infrastructure, as was done under the NDC Government of former President Mahama, we did well as far as the health crisis was concerned. There was also an economic crisis and the countries that had prepared well and were good managers of the economy also did better during the pandemic. Ghana, is not one of them.
The Budget Statement presented by the Government is littered with bad numbers of both the macroeconomic and the fiscal indicators. That clearly indicates that the Government has not been a good manager of the economy. With regard to the GDP figure, the Government projected and did around seven per cent on the average before the COVID-19 pandemic. The projection for the GDP figure was 6.8 per cent yet they ended up doing 0.9 per cent and everything is blamed on the pandemic.
The IMF and other world reports indicated that on the average, the
global economy contracted by 3.5 per cent. What this means is that if one is a good or average manager of an economy, the person should be able to at least, in a worst case scenario, contract 3.5 per cent in their economy. So, if they intended to do 6.8 per cent and because of a pandemic they are not able to do that they should arrive at 3.3 per cent at least. If they did not get 3.3 per cent, it means they are not even average managers of the economy.
The countries which did averagely should get around 3.5 per cent, so if they ended up with 0.9 per cent, then even out of that contraction, they could not make the 3.3 per cent that they were supposed to make. This obviously tells us that they are bad managers of the economy.
Mr Speaker, on page 12 of the Budget Statement, the ECOWAS growth rate for 2020, which was the year of the pandemic, some economies with good managers, including economy with almost the same size as Ghana such as Cote d'Ivoire, did better than us. They did 1.8 per cent and we did 0.9 per cent and yet, we call ourselves good managers of the economy.
Even Guinea and Benin did better than us and yet we call ourselves good managers of the economy. What are we good at if I may ask?
Mr George Kwaku Ricketts- Hagan (NDC -- Cape Coast South) 6:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, with regard to deficit, the numbers they presented in the Budget Statement would expose the Government. Now, we would even be able to measure the level of incompetence from the figures that have been provided. The deficit in 2019 was 4.8 per cent but other people said it was 4.5 per cent. They all have different numbers depending on who one talks to; whether it is coming from the Ministry of Finance or the Vice President, Dr Bawumia. This is the financial engineering that the Hon Member for Bolgatanga Central, Mr Adongo, talked about. The projection was 4.7 per cent.

There is the belief that the deficit is around 18 per cent and within the next few days, it would be brutal. However, if we stick to the 13.7 per cent, that is if we include the financial clean-up cost or stick to 11.7 per cent, and this is what the Budget Statement is telling us.

Mr Speaker, again, if we look at page 15 of the abridged version of the Budget Statement which the Hon Minister read, it says; ‘fiscal impact of the COVID-19 pandemic was GH¢19.7 billion which basically tells us the expenditure on the COVID- 19 pandemic. So, if we even consider

that there was no revenue to cover that expenditure, the deficit on the COVID-19 pandemic should not be more than 5 per cent, that is if we calculate it using the figures provided. Yet, the deficit went up to 11.7 per cent --
Mr First Deputy Speaker 6:27 p.m.
Hon Second Deputy Speaker to take the Chair. Hon Member, please continue.
Mr Rickets-Hagan 6:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, basically, the deficit that they have should arrive at around 8.7 per cent or 9.7 per cent depending on which figure they used but they got 11.7 per cent. So, somebody should explain to us as to how they came about the difference between the 11.7 per cent and 8.7 per cent or 9.7 per cent. This is the level of incompetence of the Government, and this shows that this figure is not explained and can only come about as a result of the figure given on a case of financial engineering or in the process of managing the economy, they actually mismanaged the economy.
Mr Speaker, the same goes with the balance of payment. At the back of the deficit, they did a balance of payment deficit for 5.3 per cent. They also did same with inflation as they projected 8 per cent but ended up with 10.4 per cent. This is the Government that was bragging with a
single digit inflation. So, why was the inflation at10.4 per cent? This is due to the mismanagement of the economy.
The cause of the deficit as stated in the Budget Statement was as a result of panic buying during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. This was when they could not manage the feeding of citizens and the lockdown and that is where the inflation was created.
Again, there is a Table on page 13 of the Budget Statement: Table 2: ECOWAS Consumer Price Inflation (annual averages). Out of the 15 ECOWAS countries, 11 of them did better in terms of inflation than us.
The Table is here and yet, they call themselves better managers of the economy.
Mr Speaker, let us now look at our public debts. As has been mentioned by my other Hon Colleagues, it is going to the tune of GH¢291.6 billion which means that during the period of the pandemic, they added an additional loan of GH¢74.1billion, GH¢21 billion of which was wasted on financial clean-up as they call it. They wasted GH¢21 billion in collapsing nine universal banks, 15 savings and loans companies, eight financial houses and 53 financial fund
managers and thus closing 39 microfinance institutions. This is almost over 400 financial institutions and they expect to have a financial institution tomorrow?
rose
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 6:27 p.m.
Hon Member, just hold on. Yes, Hon Member for Okaikoi Central?
Mr Patrick Yaw Boamah 6:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, before the Hon Member runs out of time, my good Friend from Cape Coast South referred to some inflationary figures in Ghana. He got it all wrong and he has jumped ship to talk about the financial sector clean-up. Who will waste money to revive a bedridden sector like the financial sector? Most Ghanaians who had invested in the financial sector have all been paid. Is it a wastage?
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 6:27 p.m.
Hon Member, I hope it will be your turn soon. Hon Rickets-Hagan, your time is almost up, so, if you could wind up?
Mr Rickets-Hagan 6:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you. On the issue of exchange rates, I heard them say they are better managers of the economy and they did well with the exchange rate. The good performance of the cedi in the year 2020 has nothing to do with this
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 6:27 p.m.
Hon Member, the time allotted to you is up.
Mr Rickets-Hagan 6:27 p.m.
Mr Speaker, in conclusion, I would like to say that the President said that they know how to bring back the economy but do not know how to bring back people. He is right; they neither know how to bring back people nor how to bring back the economy.
Thank you very much.
[Hear!] [Hear!]
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 6:27 p.m.
Now, it is the turn of the Hon Member for Sefwi Wiawso - Dr Kwaku Afriyie.
Dr Kwaku Afriyie (NPP - Sefwi Wiawso) 6:37 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity.
I beg to support the Motion moved by the acting Hon Minister for Finance on Government's Financial Policy, 2021. Before I get to the meat of my submission, let me debunk certain pronouncements made by the Hon Member for Asunafo South, Hon Eric Opoku.
Mr Speaker, right in this House, if anyone should google to trendeconomy.com, they will find out that rice importation for the year 2018 was US$451,881. For the year 2017, it was US$401,000 and when we also go to noema.com, we will see that the same figures have been quoted. These are very reliable sites and they have been making economic reports on Ghana. So, the Hon Member is palpably wrong; he must revise his figures.
I would have loved to talk on a lot of issues but suffice it to say that this Budget Statement is a very balanced and nuanced one.

It answers to a lot of policy issues that are very relevant in the Ghanaian situation now.

First of all, I noticed that there have been a good policy network analysis which when you look at the submission, obviously, policy directives have been considered, discussed and the necessary take aways and trade-offs have been made. So, when we look at the overall budget thrust, we would see that it answers the problems that have been thrown up by COVID-19 in the Ghanaian situation, and this one-year budget cycle is one important step. In fact, if we make only a sectorial analysis, we would not understand it, and that is why I would return to Hon Eric Opoku who said that subsidies on agricultural machinery, for example, must be reduced.

Mr Speaker, yes, but when we look at the policy analysis, it looks like in the production chain, the Government is making a deliberate effort to put subsidies through the Planting for Food and Jobs, especially in the maize sector. We know that in poultry production, the main inputs are maize and soyabeans for proteins. This is where we must look for the subsidies because we will find them there. In fact, over the years, they have been responding to this policy shift, so we do not have to look at things in a straight-jacket manner.

Mr Speaker, I do not pretend to be an economist so I would just gravitate to an area I am very comfortable with. When we look at the agricultural sector and take into account the one-year budget cycle, while remaining on policy, we would see that the agricultural sector has been identified as one of the main drivers to ensure economic development, food security, job creation and employment and security. If Ghana was not sufficient in food production and COVID-19 had disrupted all our food supply chain, then we would have witnessed a lot of popular uprising in this country. However, that has not happened so far, and in certain areas we even had surpluses.

Mr Speaker, our natural agri- cultural investment plan is answering all these issues that I am bringing up. That is why the Planting for Food and Jobs, Rearing for Food and Jobs, Planting for Export and Rural Development and Greenhouse Villages and Agricultural Mechanisa- tion and Irrigation and all the other programmes that are being rolled out are all geared towards answering the policy variances that have occurred in the past and to make sure that our economy runs on an even curve.

Mr Speaker, I believe that supply of improved seedlings and fertilisers
Dr Kwaku Afriyie (NPP - Sefwi Wiawso) 6:47 p.m.
are very important, and as the Hon Minister for Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, I am particularly happy that at least, in the area of maize production, 95 per cent of all the seed inputs came from research that have been done by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR). I would urge my Hon Colleague that when he is making attribution and sharing the glory in the agricultural sector, he should be candid and give some of the glory to the Ministry of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation. Mr Speaker, I just found out that the Obaatanpa and the other seeds that we are planting are all as a result of the work done by the CSIR.
Mr Speaker, I believe that the steps that we are taking to, especially diversify our tree crop economy in the areas of rubber, cashew nuts and so on, are very important.
Again, this is not a critique but a suggestion from someone in the field that Ghana should take advantage of the outbreak of Cocoa Swollen Shoot Virus Disease (CSSVD) - I know we are doing a lot of replanting of cocoa, but we should take advantage and go into the area of mixed tree cropping.
Mr Speaker, they are doing this but they are replanting trees with long gestation period. I want them to look
at coconut and rubber mixed with cocoa because I believe this can help.
Mr Speaker, on agricultural mechanisation and irrigation, I believe that Ministry of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, working in tandem with the Ministry of Agriculture, should respond to the issue of climate change. We are really in it because all the reports I receive from my Sefwi Wiaso Constituency is that even though we are in March, it is raining as if we are in the raining season. Obviously, this has an impact on agriculture vis-à-vis what pertained in the past.
Mr Speaker, Ghana has been very lucky in the COVID-19 era and all the policies taken by the Ministry of Agriculture have answered some of the issues in the SDGs, especially SDGs 1, 2, 3, 8, 10, 13, 15 and 17. I am happy and that is why I said that overall, this Budget Statement is very protean and it answers a lot of questions that are out there.
Mr Speaker, it would be remiss on me if I do not talk about the cocoa sector and I noticed that Government has made a very conscious effort to help those of us in the cocoa sector. People do not know that production had slumped and the slump came from the one region; Western Region. Mr Speaker, we used to produce a third of Ghana's cocoa; 350,000 metric
tonnes but last year, we did less than 150,000 metric tonnes. Mr Speaker, what happened? Steps which should have been taken to mitigate the effect of the CSSVD by the previous regime was not done because when we have CSSVD, the effect occurs around eight to 10 years later when we see the full economic impact. This is what has engendered the slump in Ghana's cocoa production and by the two years aberration, where there was a reverse smuggling from Cote d'Ivoire, counting from 2012 to now, there has been a consistent fall in our output.
Also, I would say that President Akufo-Addo has not been very lucky, especially with regard to the external prices of cocoa. For example, the prices of cocoa slumped somewhere last year to less than US$2,000 per metric tonnes whereas at their peak, the NDC regime during 2015 to 2016 saw a rise as high as US$3,200.
Mr Speaker, so Government has had to forfeit part of its share in the export price to the extent that Ghanaians are not aware that the net Free on Board (FOB) price of the Government to the farmers have been net worth of 100 per cent. This means that for the past three years, the Government has forfeited its share of the exports from cocoa. For example, in 2017 the producer price was 104
per cent, in 2018 it was 106 per cent, and it was only in 2019 that the Government paid something akin to what pertained to the past and this was 79 per cent. Mr Speaker, in 2020/2021, thanks to the Living Income Differential (LID), the Government is paying farmers 121 per cent of the FOB and this means that the Government is taking nothing at all. So, contrary to the popular thought, this Government has been very good to us.

Mr Speaker, let me say to my colleagues on the other Side, and I would want to quote one of my Latin maxims, ex nihilo nihil fit, which means nothing comes out of nothing. And if you would want your economy to do well, certain programmes must be in place. So when they cite those things in isolation that this has gone down and that has gone up, I just do not get it. This is the difference in policy situation and even in ideological terms between New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the National Democratic Congress (NDC).

Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 6:47 p.m.
Thank you, Hon Member.
It is now the turn of Hon Richard Acheampong.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 6:57 p.m.
per cent tax to recover the financial sector clean-up. This is a five per cent before profit.
Mr Speaker, meanwhile, I would want to refer Hon Members to the Budget they presented. By the end of 2014, the finance and insurance activities grew by 21.4 per cent. In 2015, it was 12.9 per cent; in 2016, it was eight per cent; 2017, 17.7 per cent; and in 2018, minus 8.2 per cent.
In 2019, before COVID-19, it grew by 1.6 per cent and they ended the year with a growth of 4.7 per cent, and they are going to introduce another five per cent tax on them? Already, they are paying the National Stabilisation Levy which is five per cent, and so if you add the two, they would be paying 10 per cent. [Interruption] I am repeating because it is numbers we are talking about. Mr Speaker, unless they present a different Budget for different debate.
Mr Speaker, banks are in for profit. They buy money and sell money, and so by the end of the day, they would pass on these costs to the customers since the cost of doing business would increase and whoever is going to patronise their businesses would also have to pay higher. And we are told they are going to introduce sanitation tax. How can
somebody pollute the environment and somebody in my village where there is no landfill site be asked to pay for the mess somebody has created. We can introduce the pollutant pay principle so that whoever caused the pollution pays for it. This is the way to go.
Mr Speaker, we cannot overburden the ordinary taxpayer because their disposable income has already decreased. Workers have not received what is due them, and at the same time, Government is increasing more taxes on them. They cannot afford to pay.
Mr Speaker, the Government is telling us that they have a projected revenue of GH¢72.4 billion as against an expenditure of GH¢113 billion. The deficit is GH¢41 billion which we are going to deal with. We would borrow to finance the GH¢41 billion. At the end of the day, what development project are we going to deal with?
Before the elections, Government used the NBSSI to advance money to other people under the guise of supporting them because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Let us ask ourselves if they have any data to show that those who received the moneys actually applied these moneys in productive ventures. They used the money on chop chop, to wit they
squandered the money. By the end of the day, there is no productivity in the system.

They use the money on unproductive sectors. So they borrow to gift people. They use the money and again, they are calling on all of us to finance that debt.

Mr Speaker, in my Constituency, the previous Administration planted poles. They were doing rural electrification project. Some of the communities have transformers and are left with just dressing of the transformers and it has taken this Government four good years.

For four good years, they could not connect these communities to the national grid. They sit in Accra and tell me that there is excess capacity so all of us should pay for it whereas there are people in some communities ready to receive the power and pay for it.

Some communities have been energised. They need meters so that they can pay. We sit in Accra and deny them for four good years and we are here complaining of excess capacity. This is gross incompetence on the part of Government. We cannot allow those things to fester and by the end

of the day, the burden is pushed on the ordinary person who sleeps in darkness. The person who does not have any potable water to drink and by the end of the day, they ask such a person to pay additional taxes. Mr Speaker, this is not the way to go.

Mr Speaker, I have a lot to say but before I conclude, as a Deputy Ranking Member for the Committee on Judiciary, I refer the House to paragraph 1054 and 1055:

“The General Legal Council (Ghana School of Law) enrolled 549 Lawyers to the Bar in the year 2020. The Council disposed of 82 disciplinary cases out of 124 complaints against lawyers received. The Ghana Law School conducted an entrance examination for 2,701 applicants in August, 2020 for admissions into the Ghana School of Law out of which 1,045 students passed. This represents a 23 per cent rise in the number of students who passed the entrance examination in 2019.

In 2021, the Ghana School of Law expects to conduct entrance examinations for 2,200 applicants and admit 550 to the School of Law while 450 students are expected to be called to the Bar. The General
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 6:57 p.m.
Hon Member, be winding up. Your time is up.
Mr Richard Acheampong 6:57 p.m.
We need to find space for these young people to get training into the Law Faculty.
Mr John F. Osei (NPP -- Abirem) 7:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to contribute to the Budget Statement and Economic Policy for 2021, which was ably presented on behalf of the President
by the Leader of the House who acted on authority of the President as the Finance Minister.
Mr Speaker, in doing so, I would like to draw the attention of our Colleagues on the other Side to the fact that what we are doing today is forming the basis for our progression in the future. I was surprised when my Hon Colleague John Jinapor and Hon Ricketts-Hagan said that the Budget in its totality was incompetent. But as we all know, the word “incompetent”, I can say confidently is the surname of our friends from the other Side. What I am imploring them to do is to advert their minds to what their own Colleague said -- the former Member of Parliament for Ejura/Sekyedumase, Hon Pangabu. The good things that he saw and the policies rolled out by the President of the Republic, His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo in the agricultural sector are what we all have to look at.

Mr Speaker, from what we saw and the figure in the Budget, agriculture was able to stand on its feet

to churn out a positive growth of 4.5 per cent under the pandemic.

Mr Speaker, the figures I have here for the performance of various Governments from 2001 under the leadership of former President Kufuor, agriculture grew by 4.0 per cent. In 2002, 4.4 per cent; 2003, 6.1 per cent, 2004, 7.5 per cent. In short, the average of the two terms figures put together was at 5.3 per cent growth.

Mr Speaker, if we come to our friends, under the presidency of the late Prof. Mills and former President Mahama, the average for their eight- year term came to 3.4 per cent.

Mr Speaker, the performance under President Akufo-Addo's first term stands at 5.0 per cent and from all indications, we can confidently conclude that by the end of the second term, the growth of agriculture would be unprecedented. [Hear! Hear!] -- I am saying so because if we look at the interventions and flagship programmes that have been rolled out since 2017, they are in to solve problems under food security, job creation, foreign exchange earnings, and raw materials for industrialisation.

Mr Speaker, the interventions are mainly geared towards financing of agriculture in our country. If we look

at Planting for Food and Jobs, a lot has been done in that sector. If we look at the number of beneficiaries from 2017 to 2020, just the beneficiaries for subsidised seeds, subsidised fertilisers.

The way we used to farm in Ghana has drastically changed. The rate of change and what we see is unprecedented. If you look at a sub programme like Planting for Export and Rural Development, just last year, at the close of 2020, the Tree Crop Development Authority was launched. What I see in that particular intervention is what will solve the problem of our country.

The overreliance on cocoa for foreign exchange will change. It will also improve by bringing in the tree crops like cashew, shea, coconut, mango, citrus, et cetera. What the Government has done under this intervention is to kick-start the nurseries and all the infrastructure that will be required to get it going. A chief
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:07 p.m.
Hon Member, be winding up.
Mr J. F. Osei 7:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, from the foregone contributions, I can confidently conclude that Ghanaians have saved this country by voting again into office the Government of NPP, under the leadership of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo. I thank Ghanaians for reposing that trust and confidence in his Government by giving him another term.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:07 p.m.
Hon Members, listen to Hon Sampson Tangombu Chiragia.
Mr Sampson Tangombu Chiragia (NDC -- Navrongo Central) 7:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity. Before I begin, I would beg to use the words “inconsistent record” and I should not be penalised.
Mr Speaker, I would start with harmonisation of the Tax Identification Number (TIN) to the National Identification Card. The source is from GRA website. The document came out before the Budget was read. With your permission, I beg to read the background:
“The Vice President, Alhaji Dr Bawumia directs GRA to use the Ghana Card unique identification number basis for complying with the need to establish a taxpayer identification number system. The Vice President further directs that conventions from the Ghana Card be completed by 1st April, 2021.”
Mr Speaker, there are inconsistencies because if they are saying that everybody with the National Identification number will synchronise it with the TIN, it simply means that anybody with the Ghana Card number can simply be accessed to be taxed.
Mr Speaker, they have quickly come here to say that they are giving exceptions to the various groups: Suspension of CIT for the second and third quarters. Why is it not for the first quarter? It simply means that if they are taking off with the Ghana
Card from 1st April, 2021, then there is no need for anybody to be accessed either by CIT, suspension taxes on business because they will be accessed based on the data on the Ghana Card. That data gathered on the Ghana Card is what will be used to assess them. With this, why do they not tell us the truth that they are converting back to the old system, where businesses and individuals were assessed, so that, the tax stamp should be abolished?
When they say that, then people will know the truth and they will know that they are not suspending taxes and they are not giving exceptions because they will still be assessed. Taxes are assessed based on yearly assessments so that persons can even be assessed in April or December.

Mr Speaker, rebate on CIT and give the person a plan. December is the month of assessment, the only bit on entertainment and the others would go with the self-assessment system. So, whether we give them rebate or not, those companies would assess nil tax because there is no income. Our tax is paid on just the income, so, it is not just we rebating them because whether we like it or not, there is even no income for us to assess. So, why do they not tell us the truth? They should let us know that the economy
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:17 p.m.
Hon Member for Navrongo Central, please, be winding up.
Mr Chiragia 7:17 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I am already winding up. The truth of what I am saying is that if one has a problem and refuses to tell anybody, then nobody can help him. In this country, the problem is not about taxes, the problem of this country is about how we can look somewhere and mobilise
moneys to build our economy. Imposing these types of taxes, I am not sure that we would go anywhere. This is because the question is, what is the target group? They are saying today that young entrepreneurs who started business recently are exempted from the payment of taxes for five years.
The categories include those from the communications technology, agro service, energy, tourism, and others. They are saying that all those people are exempted from tax for five years, meanwhile, they are imposing taxes on other things, so, which area are we looking at? Where is our catchment group? Who are we imposing the new identification numbers on?
Mr Speaker, let us remind ourselves that when we started the Ghana Card, there was a problem --
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:17 p.m.
Hon Member, your time is up.
Mr Chiragia 7:17 p.m.
Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. [Hear! Hear!]
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:17 p.m.
Thank you very much, Hon Member.
I would now call on the Hon Member for Tema West, the Hon Carlos Ahenkorah.
Mr Kingsley Carlos Ahenkorah (NPP - Tema West) 7:27 p.m.
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to contribute to this Won ya wo hie Budget Statement which was intelligently delivered by the Hon Minister holding fort for the Minister for Finance, our Hon Leader, the Hon Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu. In fact, he did a very good job that I am sure most of us could not even have done half of what he did. I actually praised him for that wonderful work.
Mr Speaker, when my Hon Colleague, Hon Ricketts-Hagan, ended his contribution, he tried to permutate the President's intelligent words of knowing how to bring back an economy, but not knowing how to bring back human life. He tried to even say that yes, we do not know how to bring back human life, and we still do not know how to bring back an economy.
I find this statement of his very unfortunate because if you ask me, I would say that but for NPP taking over the realms of Government in 2017, the manufacturing industry especially would have collapsed. I thought and hoped that he would have come to speak on industry or trade where he has had a lot of expertise being a former Deputy Minister.
Mr Speaker, let me quote from the Ghana Statistical Service's rebased 2013 - 2018 annual GDP which was published in April, 2019; I quote from figure 1.4. In determining the growth rate of GDP at constant 2013 prices in percentages, industry was as follows:
“In 2014, it was 1.1 per cent; in 2015, it was 1.1 per cent; in 2016, it rose to 4.3 per cent.”
Amazingly, in 2017, we had 15.7 per cent, and in 2018, we got 10.6 per cent.
Mr Speaker, but for COVID-19, I am sure we would be hovering probably above 20 per cent, and all this is based on that intelligent idea that the President, Nana Akufo-Addo, came up to revolutionise the economy. We came up with a 10 point transformation agenda to transform the manufacturing sector of this country. Here today in this Budget Statement, a few of these 10 pointers have been highlighted.
Mr Speaker, if you give me the opportunity, I would start from 1D1F, which is the flagship project that we embarked on when we entered 2017. Out of the 260 districts in Ghana, at least, 148 of them have seen a 1D1F project sited there. We are left with only 112 districts which I am sure that if the Ghana Cares Obaatanpa Programme takes off, those districts
Mr Speaker, 1D1F programme was premised on five factors 7:37 a.m.
create jobs; enhance the natural resource endowment of the various districts; promote production or manufacturing for export to improve on our forex position; manufacture import substitutes so that we reduce the extent of importation, and the last but not least was to check or control rural- urban migration. Mr Speaker, this has worked well that today as I speak to you, some people in the various districts boast of factories coming to their areas for the first time.
Mr Speaker, we also decided to have as a strategic agenda what is called Strategic Anchor Industries. With that, you would realise that Ghana over relied on three major
commodities for export - gold, timber and cocoa. From time immemorial, even before independence, these are the only three export commodities that we have banked our economy on. Today, the Government of President of Akufo-Addo has adopted the Strategic Anchor Industries which are the growth poles that we intend to prop this economy on going forward.
Mr Speaker, I can talk about the pharmaceuticals, garment textiles, and automobile industries. As we speak, today in Ghana, vehicles are assembled here. Nissan, Toyota, VW, Kantanka and Sinotruk are here. All these companies produce vehicles here in Ghana. [Hear! Hear!] Mr Speaker, but for President Akufo- Addo's vision, all these would have come to nought.
Let us fast-track to the COVID- 19 period. When other countries were not willing to export PPEs because they needed them, we found ways and means to manufacture some here. Our textiles and garment industries supported this feat by providing or producing 14 million nose masks here in Ghana.

There were over 90,000 PPEs for hospitals and other organisations.

Mr Speaker, if you ask me, I will say that if we should use these strategic industries as pillars of growth, it would change this economy going forward and change us forever. We would stop relying on only cocoa, gold and timber. I think that this is the time that my friend on the other Side should support President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to go forward.

Mr Speaker, for the first time since independence, this is the only Government that is conscious of earmarking land for industry.

During the First Republic, Dr Kwame Nkrumah's tenure, we were able to identify North Industrial Area, South Industrial Area, among others. We have not had any Government come in to consciously say that they want to construct an industrial park to reserve land for development of industry apart from President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo's Government.

Today, as I speak to you, we have Black Ivy, we have a new one by Free Zones which started in Takoradi. We also have the Greater Kumasi Industrial Area and the Dawa which has come on stream.

This is the only time, yet they are telling me they will not support this Budget? I am sorry, but I think that we should revise our notes and have
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:37 a.m.
Hon Ahenkorah, wind up please.
Mr Ahenkorah 7:37 a.m.
Mr Speaker, while I have about four minutes to finish, I would like to touch on Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) development which is the conscious effort to get our MSMEs enterprises to survive. They have supported this economy from time immemorial. Whether we are good or bad, it is our MSMEs that have supported the economy, so we cannot look for new companies and forget about the old ones.
What the President did in this COVID-19 times was to support MSMEs with GH¢600 million. National Board for Small Scale Industries (NBSSI) was able to disburse over GH¢500 million and this is what we call pragmatic utilisation of resources. Consider the fact that today, we are moving Business Resource Centres (BSC) to various districts where people in our rural areas who want to indulge in industry do not have to come all the way to Accra. When they enter the BRC,
they would find the Ghana Standards Authority, Ghana Revenue Authority, the Registrar General's Department among others.
It is a one stop shop and my Hon Colleagues here would tell you that a lot of them have new and modern buildings with everything inside. They have it in their districts and this is the handiwork of somebody who is prepared for the new Africa, where the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) has come to stay. We are preparing the minds of our people, our rural folk, Ghanaians and business men, to support them to be able to move and make the country fine.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:37 a.m.
Hon Member --
Mr Ahenkorah 7:37 a.m.
Mr Speaker, I am concluding.
I would want to also touch on the fact that we are making conscious efforts to also ensure that business regulations are respected. They would propel our country as one of the best destinations to do business in Africa. We have created a portal which has registered over 600 business regulations where companies or any individual who wants to cross-check any business regulation can go there and verify.

Mr Speaker, so while concluding, I would like to say a little about tourism.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:37 a.m.
Hon Member, thank you very much.
Mr Ahenkorah 7:37 a.m.
Mr Speaker, so I conclude by saying that the Year of Return which was 2019 was so successful that the Diasporans were expecting to look beyond the return. Unfortunately, COVID-19 did not allow us, but I can tell you that as far as I am concerned, the Year of Return was so much of a success that today, it has improved on our investment opportunities in this country.
The new Budget touches on the fact that tourist attraction centres in Ghana are going to be improved and that is what I am praying that the Government would push for and make sure that those places are well improved.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:37 a.m.
Now, let us turn to Hon Dr Jasaw, MP for Wa East.
Dr Godfred Seidu Jasaw (NDC -- Wa East) 7:37 a.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you very much for the opportunity to
contribute to the debate on the Motion.
Mr Speaker, I would like to make a few comments, but generally, they would run through three themes questioning the policy coherence in this Budget and Financial Policy. The deliberate lack of building on the gains that we have got so far as a country is in direct conflict with article 35 (7) of the 1992 Constitution, which with your leave, if I may read:
“As far as practicable, a government shall continue and execute projects and programmes commenced by the previous governments.”
Some of my commentary would insist that we take on board this provision of the Constitution and I would dwell largely on the agricultural sector whose sub-theme is “modernisation of agriculture and agribusiness”. I would also be questioning the elements of modernisation that we find in this Budget. I think they are inadequate and something more needs to be done.
However, before I go on to debate, may I just correct a record. One has to do with Hon Dr Kwaku Afriyie who looked at some trends in rice importation. I do not know why he did that, but I think what Hon Eric
Dr Godfred Seidu Jasaw (NDC -- Wa East) 7:47 p.m.
Opoku sought to do was to look at paragraph 394 which talked about the amount involved in rice importation.
What Hon Eric Opoku simply did was to report that H. E. President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo reported US$1.5 billion and that the Minister for Agriculture also reported US$1.5 billion. Meanwhile this current economic policy, in paragraph 394 says:
“Mr Speaker, the sovereign fact is that despite significant strides, we still spent on average GH¢1.5 billion…”
I think this is the record he sought to make sure that we correct and I hope that the records reflect that. So, Hon Dr Afriyie took us somewhere else and was talking about paragraph 401, and we did not need to go there.

The other record that I would just correct quickly also came from the Hon Member for Abirem, Mr Osei Frimpong, who mentioned that the sector grew by an average of 5 per cent under the first term of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
Mr Speaker, in paragraph 80 of the Budget Statement, it says and I beg to quote 7:47 p.m.
“Mr Speaker, the Agricultural Sector recorded an average growth of 4. 5 per cent''.
This is a House of record and we must reflect it as such. It is not 5.0, so let us get it right.
Mr Speaker, with your permission, I beg to quote paragraph 81 of the Budget Statement which says:
“The Fishing subsector had the best average growth performance of 11.6 per cent…. However, the Forestry and Logging subsector contracted by an average of 7.4 per cent…''
Mr Speaker, this means that we recorded a negative growth of 7.4 per cent and I am worried because we belong to a global community and so, if the Forestry subsector has grown by a negative, there are implications for this country to attain the SDGs especially, Goals 1, 12, 13 and 15. So, we need to do more in order to be able to reflect the fact that we are now global and we signed on to implement activities and projects that would contribute to attain these SDGs. I do not see that reflected adequately in the Budget Statement.
Mr Speaker, my next point has to do with paragraph 388 on page 82 of the Budget Statement which says:
“Additionally, 15 small dams, in support of the One Village One Dam (1V1D) initiative, will be constructed...''
Mr Speaker, the fact that we have implemented some projects and programmes in the past, some of which have created dams and so we keep talking about 1V1D -- I hope that there is some evaluation of the kind of dams that we have been able to dig so far in the country. What is found on the fields are not dams but ponds. So, if we want to formulate an economic policy in 2021, we should be clear that what we talk about are dams and not ponds.
Mr Speaker, the other issue I want to speak about is on paragraph 391 which with your permission, I beg to quote. It says:
“Mr Speaker, we are also confronting another structural challenge to commercial agriculture this year. Leveraging on digital technology and working more closely with stakeholders, we will create a Ghana Land Information Bank (GhLIB)…''
Mr Speaker, my question is what happened to the Land Administration Projects 1and 2? Instead of us rushing to take names and glories for some of these initiatives, it is important that in the spirit of policy coherence, we build on what we have attained as a country otherwise, it would go in conflict with the constitutional requirement in article 35 (7), where we tend to jump on everything all the time and at the end of the day, it is difficult to track what exact progress we make as a country.
It is important to appreciate that a lot of work has been done already in the LAP Phases 1 and 2, so this may just be a build on, on that to let it be applicable and usable. I know politically, my Hon Friends on the other Side would say that they started the GhLIB initiative that should not be the case. What is even worrying is that when we refer to the figures, we do not really see what commitment has been made to this all-important policy on land.
Mr Speaker, the other issue I would want to point out is what we define as the elements of modernisation. One quick thing that comes to my mind is that we would mechanise for example, the agricultural production processes and one of which is land preparation. In the Budget Statement, not enough was
rose
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:47 p.m.
Hon Member, hold on.
Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu 7:47 p.m.
Mr Speaker, in truth I have listened to him and he has made good points but we have an Order Paper Addendum to do and I wanted to point out that he has already exhausted his time by a minute. So, if he could wrap up - I do not intend to do anything injurious to him for him to say that I am concerned with time. At least, we should also observe the protocols in this House.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:47 p.m.
Hon Member, just take cue and wind up.
Dr Jasaw 7:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker, what I want us to look at more seriously is that, in the agricultural sector for example, we are happy that even in the COVID-19 economy, the sector has been very robust and that at least, it grew by an average of 4.58 per cent. We need to think about what to introduce in the Budget Statement to make it sustainable and to be sure that the gains that we have chalked in the last year, are not eroded.
Mr Speaker, with the current Budget Statement and the taxes and all those other challenges that come with it, I am afraid we need to do something drastic to change, otherwise, the gains that we have recorded so far may be lost. We should look at it along three levels and one of them is to look at the production side of it and see what exactly we do in production.

So far, Planting for Food and Jobs has always been touted as the main block for enhancing production in the sector and so on.

Mr Speaker, there are a lot of losses, especially in the area of fertiliser supply. Just last May, it was reported that a GH¢120 million worth

of fertiliser could not be accounted for. As I read through this Budget Statement, I do not see any arrangement in place to ensure that there is a clear accountability for this and if we continue in that trajectory, I am afraid, we will not get the gains we are looking for.

It is important that we think about introducing intermediaries between the production sector and the consumers. I also think we should not only be emphasising on warehousing but agro processing. So, to what extent are we processing the --?
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:57 p.m.
Hon Member, your time is up.
Dr Jasaw 7:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker, thank you very much.
[Hear!] [Hear!]
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:57 p.m.
Hon Members, debate on this Motion will be deferred to tomorrow; 17th March, 2021.
Hon Majority Leader, respectfully, any indication?
Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu 7:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker, there is an Order Paper Addendum which is one item and so,
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:57 p.m.
Hon Members, presentation of Papers.
PAPERS 7:57 p.m.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:57 p.m.
Now, the procedural Motion can be moved. Hon Majority Leader?
Majority Leader (Mr Kyei- Mensah-Bonsu) 7:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I beg to move, that notwithstanding the provisions of Standing Order 80(1), which requires that no Motion shall be debated until at least, forty-eight hours have elapsed between the date on which notice of Motion is given
and the date on which Motion is moved, the Motion for the adoption of the Report of Leadership on the composition of membership of the ECOWAS Parliament and the Pan- African Parliament may be moved today.
Alhaji Mohammed-Mubarak Muntaka 7:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I beg to second the Motion.
Question put and Motion agreed to.
Resolved accordingly.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:57 p.m.
Item numbered 3?
MOTIONS 7:57 p.m.
Majority Leader (Mr Osei Kyei- Mensah-Bonsu) 7:57 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I beg to move, that this honourable House adopts a Report of Leadership on the composition of membership of the ECOWAS Parliament and the Pan- African Parliament.
Mr Speaker, in doing so, I beg to present the Report.
1.0 Introduction The Leadership of the House met
and composed the Membership of Parliament's Delegation to the ECOW AS Parliament and the Pan- African Parliament.
Mr Speaker, the Eighth Parliament of the Fourth Republic having commenced, it is imperative to compose the membership of the Parliamentary Delegations for the effective discharge of the mandate of Ghana's Parliament at the international level.
2.0 Membership of the Eighth Parliament
Membership of the Eighth Parliament is composed as follows: Majority Caucus [made up of the NPP (137 members and an Independent Member)] - 138; Minority (made up of the NDC) -137. This ratio of 138: 137 in the 275 Members of Parliament, for the time being, would be a guide in the composition of the two Parliamentary Delegations of the House.
3.0 Recommendations
Leadership, after thorough deliberations, accordingly recom- mends as follows:
1. That in accordance with established practice and having regard to Oder 154, the composition of the parliamentary delegations, was based on the ratio of 138:137 members for the Majority Caucus and the Minority Caucus respectively.
2. That per the agreed ratio of 138:137 members, the five (5) membership of the Pan-African Parliament delegation, works out in three (3) Members from the Majority Caucus and two (2) Members from the Minority Caucus and the eight (8) members for the ECOWAS Parliament works out to four (4) members for the Majority Caucus and four (4) members for the Minority Caucus.
3. It is accordingly recommended that the two parliamentary delegations be composed as follows:
AFENYO-MARKIN DELEGATION 7:57 p.m.
PAN-AFRICAN PARLIAMENT DELEGATION 7:57 p.m.
DELEGATION 7:57 p.m.
Mr Second Deputy Speaker 7:57 p.m.
Before the Hon Minority Chief Whip comes in, Mr Speaker, would take the Chair.
[Pause] --
MR SPEAKER
Mr Speaker 8:04 p.m.
Yes, Hon Minority Chief Whip?
Alhaji Muntaka 8:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I beg to second the Motion before the House and before I do that I crave the indulgence of the House to make a correction on the first Table - item numbered 7; it should rather be Hon Emmanuel Kwasi Bedzrah.
Mr Speaker, in supporting the Motion, let me add that we had
existing Hon Members on this Parliament and their tenure has not ended. With the past experience we faced in the re-composition of Hon Members, we tried to change existing Members only to get to the ECOWAS Parliament to be faced with fracas.
I believe that Leadership took into consideration that Hon Members will have to finish their terms even if Leadership intends to replace them with other persons but they would have to finish their terms. So, it narrows the space for inclusion of more Hon Members and makes it difficult. For example, if we consider the ECOWAS Parliament, only about four new Hon Members from both Sides of the House had to be added and in the case of the Pan-African Parliament, there was only one space that needed to be filled with the Minority side and two spaces to be filled on the side of the Majority Leader.
Mr Speaker, in the future, the role of women in this Parliament would have to be looked at especially, with the Pan-African Parliament.

Even though the new Hon Members have not gotten enough
Alhaji Muntaka 8:07 p.m.


country signatories, they insist that the female representation should be 40 per cent in the case of the Pan-African Parliament. So for that matter they should have been two, but on the existing protocol it is at least for one. But it is the new protocol that has not yet received enough signatories; it is supposed to be two and so I think that in future we need to take steps to comply with the new one even though it has not yet received signatories.

Mr Speaker, it is same with ECOWAS Parliament because it is eight persons and if we look at the percentage of women in this Chamber, if we relate it directly, we would say that two women should have been part of the delegation, but obviously because of the limitation and existing members, I believe that going into the future, when we do these things, we need to factor it seriously and ensure that we would have at least two women participating in each of the two Parliaments.

Mr Speaker, I know that this usually comes with a lot of difficulties for Leadership knowing the interest - and sometimes very senior Hon Members want to represent the House. But under the given circumstances, this is

the best we can do for now and we hope that when the tenure of the existing members expire, maybe some changes would be made.

Mr Speaker, with these comments I beg to second the Motion.

Question proposed.
Mr Speaker 8:07 p.m.
Since there is no contribution because it is a Report from the Hon Leaders, I would put the Question.

“You are afraid to talk”. As I know, your Hon Leaders are not intimidating. To even have the courage to say that you are afraid to talk does not mean that you are intimidated. It means you have the freedom to even say that. It is your right and if you want to contribute, kindly do so before I put the Question.

Question put and Motion agreed to.
Mr Speaker 8:07 p.m.
Hon Members, we would continue with item numbered 4 and 5 on the Order Paper Addendum -- Resolution.
RESOLUTIONS 8:07 p.m.
Chairman of the Committee (Mr Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu) 8:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I beg to move, that
WHEREAS 8:07 p.m.
NOW THEREFORE THIS 8:07 p.m.
HONOURABLE HOUSE 8:07 p.m.
HEREBY RESOLVES THAT 8:07 p.m.
WHEREAS 8:07 p.m.
NOW THEREFORE THIS 8:07 p.m.
HONOURABLE HOUSE 8:07 p.m.
HEREBY RESOLVES 8:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker 8:07 p.m.
Hon Members, these are the Hon Members who would represent us at these very important bodies. I can only pray that they continue to keep the flag of Ghana flying high. The earlier Hon Members have always performed well and I want to urge Hon Members to continue giving them maximum support because they are going to represent our beloved country. Hon Members, on your behalf, I congratulate all the Hon Members for this recognition and honour.
Leadership, any guidance or I should proceed to adjourn the House?
Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu 8:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, just to add that lately, the Reports from these two delegations have not been forthcoming to the House so even though they are going to represent us, because they do not often feed us with Reports, we are not too sure of whatever goes on there. So, I would plead with them that when they go to represent us, they should submit Reports of the transaction of business there to this
Mr James K. Avedzi (NDC -- Ketu North) 8:07 p.m.
Mr Speaker, I beg to second the Motion.
Question put and Motion agreed to.
Resolved accordingly.
House and wherever it is possible, we are supposed to input it into the Agenda. I know that often they are not given the Agenda ahead of time, but on occasions when they do, they are supposed to also relate to us to have some inputs from the House before they travel outside. Unfortunately, I do not remember that this has ever been done so I would plead with them that at least, at the Committee levels, they can relate to the various Committees of the House who may have something useful to contribute because they are our representatives.
Mr Speaker, I just wanted to add that and we can only wish them well and they will conduct themselves well, knowing that they would be representing the Parliament of Ghana in Abuja and Johannesburg.
Mr Speaker, thank you.
ADJOURNMENT 8:07 p.m.
  • The House was adjourned at 8.17 p.m. till Wednesday, 17th March, 2021 at 10.00 a.m. in the forenoon.