Accra, Feb 24, GNA – Professor Jane Naana Opoku-Agyemang, the Vice-Presidential Candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) for the 2020 presidential election, has called for a national industrial policy.
The industrial policy, which is to be crafted devoid of partisanship, together with five other proposals, could turn the fortunes of the Ghanaian economy around and spur the country into economic prosperity.
The five other proposals are gender inclusiveness in the formal economy, promotion of ethnic diversity, international migration policy, digital transformation, and improvement of access to education to ensure job creation.
Prof Opoku-Agyemang said this at an event to commemorate the overthrow of Ghana’s first President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah on the theme: “56 years after the overthrow of Nkrumah; the state of the Ghanaian economy.”
She explained that with the economy being in “deep distress,” it was important to revisit some of the policies of Nkrumah with “long-term plans that weaves all the sectors together, set proper benchmarks [for the plans] and do serious monitoring and evaluation.”
Such a vision must be anchored on uplifting the vulnerable and creating a prosperous nation that was at peace with itself and others.
The industrial policy, as an official strategy of the country to encourage economic growth, she said, should focus on building a domestic manufacturing sector that was continentally and globally competitive.
There was also the need for strengthening of the transport and telecommunication sector, which “should be part of a cohesive and unified intervention towards making an entire economy grow over time.”
She also called for the importation of technologies that would “gradually help in producing more goods in the country from scratch to finish than to import the finished products.”
That would spur large industries in every region in the country [based on the resources at their disposal] to engender economic transformation, create more decent employment and enhance the living conditions of the citizenry.
She said: “Although one cannot turn this around overnight, we need a roadmap on the sectors so an administration can decide to prioritise and we can grow our economy and evolve it.”
Prof Opoku-Agyemang added that it had become important to have a policy that would limit the importation of finished goods and emphasised on the creation of machinery.
On the Electronic Transactions Levy (E-Levy), she was surprised that the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, said the country had no money, yet it expected the citizenry to have money to pay the E-Levy.
She said: “If what the Minister for Finance is saying is true, and since he hasn’t denied, and I have no reason to doubt him that government has no money. How can the poor citizens have money?”
She said: “What we need is proper economic planning that takes our circumstances into consideration with an overall aim of making us truly independent, and it shouldn’t be that this country is doing it, therefore, we must do it.”
Mr Kwesi Pratt Jnr, General Secretary of the Socialist Movement of Ghana (SMG), bemoaned the current state of the Ghanaian economy, and was worried about the use of statistical figures in determining the state of the economy rather than the real living conditions of the people.
He insisted that taxation, including the E-Levy and going to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank would not be a panacea to Ghana’s economic woes.
The World Bank, and Economic and Finance experts had said Ghana did not require an International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme to guarantee a strong economic footing to accelerate its national development.
Mr Pratt said: “Over the last five years, the price of ‘kenkey’ has doubled,” and “Our many friends and relatives have not been paid for seven months, even though they continue to go to work daily; that’s a statement about the Ghanaian economy.”
He charged the government to utilise the country’s natural resources and workforce, including professionals and those in academia to solve the economic challenges facing Ghana.
GNA