The renowned economist, Dr Kwame Pianim, has rebuffed claims that the governor of the Bank of Ghana (BoG) and his two deputies were the cause of the current economic hemorrhage and loss of GH¢60billion to the bank.
He has therefore asked Ghanaians to stop blaming the governor, Dr Ernest Addison and his two deputies and drop the call for their resignation.
Speaking in an interview with an Accra-based broadcaster over the weekend, Dr Pianim said the governor and his team had not perpetuated any fraud as such could not be blamed for incompetence and mismanagement.
Dr Pianim noted that the governor’s resignation would not solve any problem.
“Resignation doesn’t solve any problem. If the governor resigns now, what happens, the same Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, who is at the core of the economic crises recommends to the same President Akufo-Addo? They appoint somebody who doesn’t know the terrain, who hasn’t gone through this experience to be able to solve the problem, No!” he emphasised.
“What I am saying is that was it through incompetence? No. Not incompetence. Was it through fraud? Did the governor benefit? Did any of his companies benefit from what he did? No!” he said.
The renowed economist also stated that the BoG did nothing wrong by not seeking parliamentary approval before supporting the government in a bid to revive a struggling economy.
“I don’t recall that they…BoG needs parliamentary approval. Remember, we suspended the Fiscal Responsibility Act, when the fiscal responsibility was removed it was saying in effect, we cannot obey the regulations that we have governing the fiscal, so we are suspending it,” he added.
In addition he said “When the Minister of Finance went to parliament and they agreed to suspend the Fiscal Responsibility Act, parliament should have asked, what happens to the equivalent that is the Monetary Policy Act which is Article 36 of the Amendment BoG Act which says that if there is an emergency and BoG needs to be able to suspend the rules surrounding monetary policy what they do is to inform the Minister of Finance.”
Categorically, he said “it is the Minister for Finance’s responsibility to report to parliament. We didn’t make BoG responsible to go to parliament. So when the Minister of Finance went to parliament to suspend the Fiscal Responsibility Act, somebody from the opposition should have asked, what happened to Article 36 of the Banking Act. And the Minister should have said concurrently that that part is also suspended because you cannot suspend the Fiscal Responsibility Act and leave the complimentary dimensions on the monetary policy side”.
BY CLIFF EKUFUL
