Deputy Ranking Member of the Finance Committee, Dr. Gideon Boako, has challenged claims that the economy inherited by the NDC government was in a “sick state”, arguing that the 2025 Budget presentation proves otherwise.
Dr. Boako pointed out that Ghana’s economy recorded a 5.7% growth rate, which contradicts previous assertions by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) that the economy was in a coma.
“Never in the history of this country has any government left with such figures. As of today, the Finance Minister has been forced to speak to the data by suggesting that the economy grew by 5.7%,” he stated.Dr. Boako also criticized Finance Minister Dr. Cassiel Ato Forson for presenting unaudited debt figures in his budget statement. He expressed concern over the credibility of the data, questioning why the Minister would announce figures that had not been verified.
“Did you hear the Finance Minister, after mentioning all these debts, come to say that they are yet to audit those figures? How can the Finance Minister of a country like Ghana go to Parliament to present figures that are not audited, that cannot be found within the government system of this country? This is scandalous. It doesn’t happen anywhere,” Dr. Boako argued.The Tano North MP further pointed out that Dr. Forson deliberately avoided mentioning the debt-to-GDP ratio, suggesting that doing so would contradict the NDC government’s narrative of inheriting a distressed economy.
“When it came to the overall gross public debt, you realize that he couldn’t add all of this to the debt stock but rather mentioned the figure recorded by the Bank of Ghana and the IMF in December 2024. That is why he smartly never mentioned the debt-to-GDP ratio—because he realized that it defeats the lies he was trying to put across,” he explained.