By Isaac Ato MENSAH
Accra- 16 November, 2018.
Yesterday’s 2019 budget speech by Ken Ofori-Atta, Ghana’s finance minister offers several teaching points.
Let us begin by looking at the speech writing and presentation angle.
The speech was widely advertised on social media as beginning at 10am.
From that time onwards, listeners and media houses that wanted to broadcast it live had scheduled their programming to accommodate that.
The finance minister ended at 2:16pm.
‘Honourable Minister, you may wait,’ the speaker announced as the heckling became overbearing.‘ I may have to extend the time if I have to.’
When the chamber of Parliament became quieter, the finance minister did the absurd.
‘Let me ask you one question,’ he intoned, revving up the noise from the Minority.
And of course the Majority joined in the sounds signifying nothing.
You could hardly blame any viewer who had difficulty identifying the adults in the chamber.
Some media houses shut off their broadcast of the speech at 2pm and changed programming.
And that is bad PR for the finance minister and a disappointment for listeners.
‘After this litany of achievements from this centre-right government, can anyone recall the social intervention policies the social democratic government of the NDC introduced in its entire eight years in government?, the finance minister asked.
And this was 1:56pm.
Clearly the speech writers must have designed this.
By the usual rules of Ghana’s parliament, the budget presentation speech is not debated during its delivery.
So when one takes the opportunity to lower the bar, then he disempowers the speaker from bringing order to public business.
Of course in the Ghanaian context these “little” infractions of speech delivery may not matter; it is part of the jombolijo and our penchant for injecting chaos into our activities.
But when you’re having a headache identifying any social interventions by both the NPP and the NDC…..
Of course if you were not doing media monitoring, you would probably have changed your channel or focus to something else.
News happening at about the same time was that Morocco was launching its USD 2 billion high speed train covering a distance of 200km from Casablanca to Tangier.
‘The LGV departed from Tangier on its way to Rabat with King Mohammed VI and [President] Macron taking the first ride,’ reported Safaa Kasraoui for moroccoworldnews.com.
The story listed the loans and sources of funding for the project.
And for me that is the context within which I see our attitude to life in contemporary Ghana.
‘What is USD 2 billion for Morocco?’ I surmised.
That’s a lot of money which is hard to come by in a nation’s quest to reach an ‘average 320 kilometers per hour between Tangier and Kenitra, a city north of Rabat, and …160 kilometers per hour from Kenitra to Casablanca’.
And what do we do with such amounts in our country?
Fasten your seat belt.
A 174-page summary of the budget released during the speech with the title, The Budget Speech of the Government of Ghana for the 2019 Fiscal Year gets you reeling….
‘Rescuing the situation regarding these seven [?failed, ?collapsed ?fraudulent] banks has, so far, cost some GH¢9.9 billion [roughly USD 2.5 billion] in monies that Government had not budgeted for and could have been put in good use to fix our numerous infrastructural needs, such as housing, roads, bridges, etc.,’ it stated at page 30.
Why is the 2019 budget being read in November 2018?
Deep breath and then a simple answer – to allow time for debate and approval by our elected reps who are the only institution with the power to approve spending in our name.
So knowing that the bla bla blab had not been budgeted for, did the administration come to our reps to seek approval before creating this monster debt?
A capital NO…….add some jombolijo steps please.
Was there a public debate on the creation of the Consolidated Bank Ghana (CBG) and the monies given to it?
Another NO.
So what does the finance minister think he is doing?
Our government’s attitude of disrespect for the rule of law is shown in paragraph 31…..
‘….Indeed following the creation of the Consolidated Bank Ghana Limited (wholly owned [by] Government of Ghana and licensed by the Bank of Ghana as a universal bank) the government capitalized it with GH¢450 million [USD100 million].
In addition, Government had to issue a bond with a face value of GH¢7.6 billion [roughly USD2 billion at the time] to cover the gap, between the deposit liabilities and the remaining good assets of the failed banks.’
Please let no one tell us that it has now been reported in the budget so it will be debated and approved.
That cannot be how public business is run.
No need for further comment on this except to say that any attempt to argue this position simply confirms why we are where we are.
My 14 year old boy (in Junior Secondary School) asked me how long it will take for Morocco to repay the loan.
I told him to imagine a train ticket of about 30 Euro for a round trip to have a scenic view of the snow-capped Atlas Mountains with toilets inside of it.
How is this Morocco quip relevant to the budget speech?
In strategic management, students are taught to analyse the economy, the specific industry within which their company operates and finally do a trend analysis of their organization’s performance over several periods before making projections for the future.
And the Finance Minister had a lot of that to do – the global economic trends and outlook, the Ghanaian economy over the past several years before his government came into office and a quarterly review of his tenure.
How did the Finance Minister conclude his speech?
The speech in parliament had very religious undertones the acme of which is, ‘For [the people that walked] in darkness have seen a great light,’ referencing the prophet Isaiah speaking of John the Baptist and Jesus the Nazarene.
The religious tone climaxes with Ken Ofori-Atta perhaps now an angel announcing, ‘I bring great tidings of joy.’
My initial thought was that given the nature of our Constitution, there could have been appropriate Quranic and other references from the Sacred Scriptures of other religions to match, but now it is clear; the budget speech was prepared for a specific audience.
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