Rotterdam, Sept. 5, GNA- The International Monetary Fund (IMF) says it is likely to agree a $3 billion deal with Ghana by the end of the year.
Kristalina Georgieva, IMF’s Managing Director told President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo that the Fund was determined to work with the Ghanaian government to ensure that an agreement for a bailout programme was in place before the end of the year.
“We understand the urgency, and we will move as quickly as possible,” she said in a closed-door meeting on the sidelines on the sidelines of the Africa Adaptation Summit, in Rotterdam, Netherlands on Monday, that Fund was determined Ghana is anticipating a three-year support package worth about three billion dollars from the IMF to restore financial and microeconomic stability mainly from external factors like the COVID-19 pandemic, and Russian war in Ukraine.
Consequently, an IMF team visited Ghana last July to start negotiations with the Government on a bailout programme.
Kristalina Georgieva stressed that Ghana’s current economic challenges were not the results of policy deficits by the government, but from external factors.
“First the pandemic, then Russia’s war in Ukraine. We need to realize that it is not because of bad policies in the country but because of this combination of shocks, and, therefore, we have to support Ghana.
“We have started very constructive discussions already and to the people of Ghana, like everybody on this planet, you have been hurt by exogenous shocks” she said.
The IMF Boss also indicated that Ghana is a member of the IMF, “a strong country with fantastic people”, and as such it is incumbent on the Fund to lend the country support.
“We have to support Ghana because your strength contributes to the strength of your neighbours; it contributes to a stronger world,” she reiterated.
On his part, President Akufo-Addo indicated that a lot of work had been done by Cabinet and the Ministry of Finance, and the document to be presented by the Ghana side “is ready for the scrutiny of the IMF.”
GNA