(ThyBlackMan.com) On February 8th, 2018 at the annual state of the Nation address, President Akufo claimed to his parliament his will to get of henceforth from a 3 years IMF financial aid program. Proud of the progress of its economy, Ghana expects to be able to pay its entire loan. Indeed, Ghanaian state under its last president John Mahama mandate contracted in 2015 to the International Monetary Fund $918-million loan to come to its end in 2018. This loan was aiming to find a solution to slow growth and high public debt. It is so common for African governments since 1960 they became independent to interact with the Bretton Woods Institution, International Monetary Fund and the World Bank through loan regime, financial help assistance, conditioned by a range of criteria most often controverted by medias and public opinion.
This kind of interaction with IMF and WB were long time criticized to maintain African countries in dependence and irresponsibility. President Akufo-Addo created a surprise by his announce. The IMF was expected an extension to December 2018 as one month before this address, the government was planning to request for an 
extension. President Akufo-Addo explained to the lawmakers the reasons of his perspective to abandon the IMF assistance as a new era for Ghana economy, despite of persisting fiscal difficulties.
He declared “We are determined to put in place measures to ensure irreversibility and sustain macroeconomic stability, so we will have no reason to seek again that powerful institution assistance. For the first time, our macroeconomic fundamentals are solid; all the critical indices are pointing in the right direction”. He added “The economy will be better in 2018, the various strategies devised by the economic management team led by Vice President Dr Mahamadu Bawumia have started yielding positive results”. He also revealed “Taxes had been reduced, inflation and interests rates were been lowered while economic growth was on the rise, increasing from 3.6 per cent in December 2016 to 7.9 per cent in 2017”.
According to the World Bank latest report “Global Economic Prospects: Sub-Saharan Africa,” Ghana will lead African economies with 8% growth in 2018. Oil and gas production shall increase and boost exports and domestic electricity production. The report clarifies that commodities like oil, gold and cocoa are the mainstay of the $43 billion economy and rising production is boosting the nation’s finances. President Akufo-Addo was confident “We have increased our international reserves, maintained relative exchange rate stability, reduced the debt to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) ratio, the rate to debt accumulation and have paid almost half of arrears inherited,” he said.
The President mentioned that government had restored teachers and nurses’ trainee allowance and doubled the capitation grants for schools and had commenced the Free Senior High School program which enabled 90,000 more students to have access to Senior High School in 2017 than in 2016.He hinted that the fiscal deficit could be reduced from 9.3 per cent to estimated 5.6 per cent of GDP. He rejoiced that the government’s team had found a efficient way to solve the oppressive debt dilemma. The annual average rate of debt accumulation, 36% in recent years has declined to 13.3 per cent as at September 2017.
Ghana’s President targets to create lot of private sectors jobs. “There is no question about the IMF program being extended beyond April 2018. We want to complete it and move on,” Akufo-Addo told reporters. The IMF commented responding that in May an extension was needed because Ghana failed to fulfill certain deal requirements on schedule. An extension would have reassured markets of the government’s commitment to fiscal discipline, analysts say.
Creating more jobs will be the next challenge. “For the ordinary ghanaian on the street we still need to keep the confidence level high. If the government is unable to fulfil some of its promises given, then the confidence may not be sustainable.” said Gideon Amissah, member of the Institute of Certified Economists of Ghana to Agence France Presse. Akufo-Addo beat Mahama in December 2016 presidential elections and inherited an economy endangered by huge public sector deficits, rising inflation, high unemployment and a weakened currency.
Sources: http://www.channelstv.com/2018/02/08/ghana-president-says-no-reason-to-return-to-imf/, http://www.afp.com
Staff Writer; Abu-Jahlil Astrid Chacha
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