Press focuses on Finance Minister’s crucial debt restructuring negotiations in China

APA – Accra (Ghana)
The report that the Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, is expected to arrive in Beijing today to meet Chinese officials to discuss a proposed restructuring of Ghana’s debt, according to a source with knowledge of the talks is one of the leading stories in the Ghanaian press on Thursday.
The Ghanaian Times reports that the Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, is expected to arrive in Beijing today to meet Chinese officials to discuss a proposed restructuring of Ghana’s debt, according to a source with knowledge of the talks.
“The talks are expected to focus on ways to reduce Ghana’s debt burden and secure additional financing assurances for the country’s economic programme,” the source said, asking not to be named because the talks are private.
The trip was postponed to the end of March because it coincided with the National People’s Congress of China meeting in early March 2023.
The Minister of Finance has already held meetings with officials of Exim Bank, China, in Ghana, all in the line of re-profiling the country’s debt to China.
Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, in an earlier meeting with the German Finance Minister, said China has committed to bilateral negotiations.
In view of that, he is hopeful a deal can be reached to enable Ghana to present its case before the IMF Board.
Ghana, which is struggling with its worst economic crisis in a generation, secured a staff-level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in December for a $3 billion loan, though asking lenders to provide financing assurances is a condition for the IMF’s board to sign off the programme.
China is Ghana’s biggest bilateral creditor with about $1.7billion of debt.
The government’s current priority is to secure IMF’s board approval, with the fine details of debt treatment operations to follow later, the source added.
The meetings will take place on Thursday and Friday.
The newspaper says that the Ministry of Health (MOH) yesterday took delivery of 500,000 additional doses of measles rubella vaccines to beef up stock nationwide.
The Sector Minister, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, said the vaccines which came in through ‘traditional supply channels would last the country a minimum of six weeks as government worked around the clock to secure more vaccines.
“We anticipate that by the end of the month, we will get more quantities of the vaccines which were in short supply, including Oral Poliomyelitis vaccine (OPV) and Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG), a vaccine for tuberculosis (TB) disease,” he assured.
Mr Agyeman-Manu who handed over the vaccines to the Ghana Health Service (GHS) as part of a day’s working visit to the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH) expressed hope that the vaccines would augment childhood immunisation exercises across the country.
“Earlier, we received 360,000 doses and distributed it across the country. Gradually, our problem is getting over and soon we will have adequate stock to take us through the year.
The vaccines we took from Nigeria is normal industry practice and nothing strange. From time to time, when a country is in short supply of vaccines, it is the practice to take some from a country that has in excess and later repay,” he clarified.
As part of the visit, the minister toured some ongoing projects within the hospital including a two-storey 101-bed Urology and Nephrology Centre, a 400-bed maternity block and the 80-bed infectious disease centre at the hospital.
Accompanied by the Director General of the GHS, Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, the Chief Executive Officer of the KBTH, Dr Opoku Ware Ampomah and other officials, the team observed massive progress on the projects, expected to boost healthcare delivery and make KBTH a centre of medical excellence in the sub-region.
The Ghanaian Times also reports that the Producer Price Inflation (PPI) rate decreased marginally to 50.8 per cent in February from 52.6 per cent in March, 2023.
This represents a 1.7 percentage point decrease in PPI relative to the 52.6 per cent recorded in January.
Addressing a news conference in Accra yesterday, the Government Statistician, Professor Samuel K. Annim, said marginal drop in the February PPI rate, which was provisional, was influenced by the drop in PPI for industry, which carries 85.0 per cent weigh of the PPI index.
He said the industry recorded PPI rate of 57.9 per cent in February from 58.8 per cent in January.
“The producer price inflation in industry less construction sector decreased to 57.9 per cent in February from 58.8 per cent in January 2023,” he said.
Mining and quarrying (61.2 per cent), electricity and gas 57.4 per cent and manufacturing (55.7 per cent) recorded rates above the national average of 50.8 per cent.
Prof. Annim said the rate in the construction sector increased to 21.1 per cent in February 2023 from 20.4 per cent in January 2023.
He said the PPI inflation in the construction of buildings sub-sector increased by 3.8 percentage points over the January rate of 45.9 per cent to 49.7 per cent in February 2023.
“The rate for the civil engineering sub-sector decreased by 0.3 percentage points to 11.1 per cent in February 2023. The specialised construction activities sub-sector recorded a 6.0 per cent inflation rate for February 2023, compared with 5.5 per cent in January,” Prof. Annim, stated.
He said under the services sector, the rate increased from 10.6 per cent in January 2023 to13.4 per cent in February 2023.
The Government Statistician explained that information and communication activity recorded the lowest rate of 4.5 per cent in February in 2023.
The Graphic says that Former President John Dramani Mahama has called for reforms in the financing of political parties to deepen the country’s democracy.
He said the reforms would also ensure that certain elements did not take undue advantage of the country’s governance system.
The former President said ethical political financing had been one area in the country’s democratic journey that had continued to elude reform, adding that the dependency on a few individuals who financed political campaigns in return for favours was a recipe for corruption.
One of the reforms he recommended was public financing of political activities, which must be accompanied by a Public Funding of Political Parties Bill, while the law that enjoined only citizens of the country to contribute financially to political activities should be enforced as well as compelling political parties to declare their incomes and their sources.
Delivering a public lecture on political party campaign financing at the University of Professional Studies, Accra (UPSA) last night, former President Mahama said without reforms, there was the “potential of mortgaging our governance system to criminals”.
The lecture and other presentations were to reopen a conversation on financing political campaigns, something that has been on the table from the very start of the country’s political journey.
The presentation covered making a case for a more transparent and broad-based citizen participation in the financing of political campaigns and the launch of a smart digital retail fundraising platform for his 2024 presidential campaign.
It was held on the theme: “Financing Political Campaign in the Ghana we want: A case for a more transparent and broad-based citizen participation”.
Present at the event were individuals from the business community, including renowned investor Sir Sam Jonah, and leaders of civil society organisations (CSOs), such as Prof. H. Kwesi Prempeh, Kwesi Jonah, Dr Rashid Dramani and Ben Boakye.
Leading members of the NDC were also present, including the immediate past running mate, Professor Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang; former and current Members of Parliament, such as Dr James Klutse Avedzi, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa and Sylvester Mensah, and a former campaign manager of the former President, Prof. Joshuah Alabi.
GIK/APA