Dr. Lord Mensah, an economist, and Senior Lecturer at the University of Ghana Business School has cautioned Ghanaians and the general public about the economic hardships that will grace the country in 2021. and beyond.
Dr. Mensah was speaking on Starrfms morning show dubbed Morning Starr.
Dr. Mensah said revealed that most of the freebies Ghanaians enjoying now will no longer be there for their enjoyment. He added that the government would have to make up for the revenue lost within the period of the freebies and the only way he can do that is to increase tax and cut down on unnecessary expenditure.
He said;
“We should expect more tax increments and some freebies that we are enjoying are not going to be there. So citizens should expect a tough 2021. I was expecting that at the point that we had COVID-19, we would have cut down some expenditure where we had control but we kept spending…you can’t eat your cake and have it.”
“I predicted that there’s no way we would provide freebies till September and not go to December. We are hiding behind COVID-19 and going in excess of our expenditure and that’s not good for all of us.”
Commenting about the debt toll of Ghana, Dr. Amoah who is also an economist also warned Ghanaians about the dangers awaiting the populates if the are no measures to cut down the rate of spending.
He said;
“The best you can do is prioritize our expenditure. Don’t go on unnecessary expenditure. If we are able to do that, we should be able to handle with our debt level..for me, I will say we need to be careful the way we are increasing our debt.
“That 71% you are calling now is dangerous but if they are into projects that will pay for themselves, that’s okay but we don’t see that in Ghana. We need to look at the debt issues and our expenditure…I will not call for another IMF because the next IMF help that we’ll be going to seek, I don’t think it will be comfortable for us. Effectively, there are things we can hold on to ourselves that will not take us back to IMF but we are not able to do that. We should ask ourselves why?”
The country’s economy will experience a downwards toll, not economic freedom if the country does not find innovative ways of creating additional revenue to make up for the monies spent so far.
