Austerity measures: Gov’t slashes budgets of MDA’s by 20%

The government has announced plans to slash the budgets of all Ministries, Departments and Agencies in the country by up to 20% for the year 2022.

The move according to President Akufo-Addo, forms part of his government’s austerity measures of reducing cost and cutting down expenditure due to the general economic difficulties associated with COVID-19.

The Akufo-Addo government appears to be facing one of the biggest challenges ever with salaries of public sector workers for February still unpaid. Cash inflows appear not to be coming in as expected with revenue collecting agencies unable to achieve their target.

This combined with the failure of the government to have the controversial Electronic Transfer Levy (E-Levy) bill passed has led to an appeal for all stakeholders to come on board to hasten the country’s economic progress.

Delivering the keynote address at the 2022 National Labour Conference at Kwahu in the Eastern Region on Monday, President Akufo-Addo said “we have to make concerted efforts as partners to hasten our recovery from COVID-19 by finding intelligent ways of bringing everyone on board to contribute their quota no matter what.”

“Government on its part is implementing a policy of cutting the budgets of Ministries, Departments and Agencies by 20% this year as its contribution.”

Source: Thenewsroomonline