Mid-year budget review only confirms harder days lie ahead of the country - Deputy Minority Chief Whip

Deputy Minority Chief Whip and Member of the Finance Committee in Parliament Ignatius Bafour Awuah, says the mid-year budget review only confirms that harder days lie ahead of the country. According to him, some elements such as reduction in some projections in macro-economic indicators point to this fact.

Speaking on "Behind the News" Mr. Bafour Awuah expressed worry about the level of borrowing by government. He said he is not opposed to borrowing, but the monies should be commensurate to development projects and must be tangible.

For his part the General Secretary of the Industrial and Commercial Workers Union, Solomon Kotei said labour expects the mid-year budget review to address bread and butter issues.

He said the current economic challenges do not offer enough incentive to the Ghanaian worker to put in peak performance.

Mr. Kotei said these notwithstanding, workers are optimistic that the reviews will factor in workers welfare which will to a large extent aid in enhancing productivity.

A Financial Analyst with Data Bank, Kingsley Martey, praised government for reviewing some of the projections, but was not happy that some targets will not be met.

He said it is worrying that year in year out, some projections in the macro environment are not met, which gives the economy negative fall outs. Mr. Martey asked government to be prudent in borrowing and manage the economy satisfactorily.

GBC