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Ghana's economy extremely weak – Kwesi Pratt reminds Bawumia

The Managing Editor of the Insight newspaper, <a href="https://www.pulse.com.gh/news/local/watch-let-your-figures-put-food-on-the-table-of-ghanaians-kwesi-pratt-to-bawumia/f3r5seb">Kwesi Pratt</a> Jnr, has asked Vice President Dr. <a href="https://www.pulse.com.gh/news/politics/bawumia-trolled-for-comparing-dumsor-under-mahama-to-covid-19-under-nana-addo/setpyrh">Mahamudu Bawumia</a> and the government to stop touting the economy of Ghana as the most buoyant.
2020 Elections: We’ll reject any ‘conie conie’ results – Kwesi Pratt
2020 Elections: We’ll reject any ‘conie conie’ results – Kwesi Pratt

According to him, the fundamentals of the country's economy are weak.

His comments come after Dr. Bawumia reminded former President John Mahama that the economy he superintended between 2012 and 2016 was so fragile that he couldn't even mitigate and cushion people from an internally created problem like dumsor.

The former President claimed the economy under the leadership of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is weak and has been exposed in just one month by the Coronavirus pandemic, which has affected several countries around the world.

Speaking to journalists at the Jubilee House on the sideline of a COVID-19 meeting, Dr. Bawumia wondered how Mahama whose administration and economy could not handle dumsor for four years would be making comparisons with a global pandemic like the Coronavirus.

"If you want to test the robustness of an economy, you test it in a time of crisis. Thankfully, we have had two crises. Under the NDC, it was an internally-generated crisis, which was dumsor. Under the Presidency of Nana Akufo-Addo, there has been an externally generated crisis, which has been the global Coronavirus pandemic."

"I just want you to ask yourself, how have these two crises been managed? The dumsor crisis which crippled this economy for four years. What were the mitigating measures offered to businesses and individuals during the dumsor, an internally generated crisis?" the Vice President asked.

"We saw that even during dumsor, electricity prices were being increased, fuel prices were being increased, teacher trainee allowances were being canceled, nursing trainee training allowances were being canceled. All of that was happening during that particular crisis," he added.

However, Kwesi Pratt speaking on Accra-based Peace FM said anyone who will claim that the economy is doing well is being deceptive.

He stated that "the fundamentals of this economy are so weak that all these fights about we have the buoyant economy and so on; we should stop it!!! because the economy is extremely weak. If we don’t change the fundamentals, there will be dire consequences".

"We're no longer in control of the economy; it’s controlled from the metropolis of the colonial enterprise; that is the fundamental problem of the economy...unless we change the fundamentals," he noted.

He further expressed shock over a research finding which indicated that 85 percent of goods in Ghana’s supermarkets are imported.

He insisted that "How can the economy grow? How can you have a vibrant economy when almost 90 percent of goods in our supermarkets are imported...and so if any politician tells you that the economy is vibrant; he is a liar because this economy is not in the best of shapes."

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