The New Patriotic Party (NPP) vice-presidential candidate, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, has told public sector workers to brace up for massive job cuts in 2017 in line with the Mahama administration’s agreement with the IMF.
Dr Bawumia said John Mahama’s claim of creating jobs for the unemployed is rather the opposite as there is an embargo on employment in the public sector as well as massive layoffs.
Touching on the government’s direct actions that had led to the unprecedented unemployment crisis facing the nation, the running mate to the NPP flagbearer, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, stated that the government in December 2015 submitted a plan to the IMF on how it was going to lay off public sector workers beginning 2017, despite earlier denials about the agreement with the IMF to retrench workers of the public sector.
“To worsen matters, government has placed a ban on public sector employment and things will worsen come next year when the government rolls out its agreement with the IMF to lay off workers. The government, in typical fashion, has denied this but it is true. Just in December 2015 the government presented a plan to the IMF for the rationalisation of civil servants beginning in 2017,” Dr Bawumia disclosed.
He once again tasked the government to fully disclose the plan on the layoffs to the Ghanaian public, saying, “I am asking the government in the interest of transparency to make this document public. The IMF is not more important than Ghanaians in the discourse on this matter. If the government has nothing to hide, it should make the document public,” Dr Bawumia told students of Accra Polytechnic at a forum organised by the Greater Accra NPP youth wing last Thursday.
Graduate Unemployment
He said graduate unemployment in the country had reached crisis proportion.
He attributed the situation to high level of corruption, increase in Ghana’s debt stock as a result of continued government borrowing, and decline in agriculture sector growth.
Speaking on the theme, ‘Unemployment: Causes and Effect,’ he said “Our problem with unemployment is not because we lack resources but we are not managing our resources properly. It’s not the amount of money you have but how to manage it.”
Dr Bawumia said the high youth unemployment situation in Ghana is a ticking time bomb which must be treated as national security issue, quoting statistics that about 60 percent of the unemployed in the country are in the age bracket of 15 and 24 years.
Corruption
Dr Bawumia said corruption, which is on the increase, is a major cause of unemployment in the country.
“If you put GYEEDA, SADA, Ameri power, Karpower and judgement debts together, the losses are in the region of GH¢5.7 billion. These monies could have been invested in agriculture or manufacturing sector to create jobs.
“The GH¢250 million wasted on SADA could have built thousands of dams for dry season farming in the Northern Region of Ghana,” the ace economist said.
Dr Bawumia said the agricultural sector, which is supposed to employ most people in the country, is growing at zero percent, stating, “If the agric sector is growing at zero percent and manufacturing is also growing at negative percent, then what is the NDC government transforming…This is negative transformation.”
He said manufacturing for the last three years had also recorded negative growth from -0.5 in 2013 to -0.8 in 2014 and -2 percent in 2015, contributing to unemployment in the country.
Debt Stock
Dr Bawumia said the massive increase in Ghana’s debt stock was a contributing factor to unemployment in the country.
According to him, the quantum of borrowing that has been undertaken by NDC government in the last seven years is nothing short of recklessness, having a direct bearing on high unemployment in the country.
“At the end of Kufuor’s administration in 2008, Ghana’s debt stock was GH¢9.5 billion. That means from independence in 1957 to 2008, Ghana’s debt stock after 51 years was GH¢9.5 billion. In just seven years between 2009 and 2015, the NDC increased the debt stock to GH¢99 billion,” he bemoaned.
He said the real effect of the reckless borrowing by the government in the last seven years is seen in the magnitude of interest payment that Ghana has been burdened with.
“Vital resources that should have gone into vital sectors to create jobs are now being used to settle debt obligations. In 2015 alone interest payment on Ghana’s debt was GH¢9.6 billion. The interest will shore up to GH¢10.5 billion in 2016,” he observed.
<<Print>>