A renowned economist in Ghana and Dean of Business School at the University of Cape Coast, Professor John Gatsi has waded into the controversies surrounding IMF conditionality for Ghana.
Contrary to the perceptions out there that IMF placed injunction on employment in Ghana as part of its conditions to grant Ghana loan, the economics guru deciphers the actual situation.
According to him, the International monetary Fund never had a condition never to employ Ghanaians.
He made this revelation in a phone interview with Obido on Radio 1 100.7FM when addressing the opinions of Ghanaians on choosing between E-Levy and IMF.
“In any case, there was no IMF program that did not employ Ghanaians. It is not true. All that the IMF said that when we check your documents there were places you should have employed 5 people but you employed 35 people. Any office place for them to work? They don’t have. Productivity, nothing. Efficiency, questionable. Then the exempted areas; the teaching field, the health sector and the security services. Then they said that the rest of the 8 years, there should be net freeze on employment which is to say that if somebody resigns, replace the person. When somebody dies, replace the person. If somebody retires, replace the person.” Prof John Gatsi explained.
He added that there a lot of misconceptions about going to IMF and blamed that on politics. He again reminded the public on the finance minister’s comment on public sector employment.
“Because of politics we are saying so many things. But i don’t think this government is afraid of going to IMF. If you trace the history of this government, the went to IMF in 2021 i.e. HIPC, and they extended it after exiting it. we need to face the truth, this government is a loving fun of IMF. In any case what did the finance minister say about the public sector, he said the sector is choked” – Prof Gatsi added.
Source: Radiooneghana