Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta says Ghana is in a better position to manage and revive the economy more than most African countries hit by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The comment from Ken Ofori-Atta comes in the wake of the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) approval of a $1 billion dollars Rapid Credit Facility to Ghana to aid addressing the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic in the country.
On Monday, April 13, 2020, the Executive Board of the IMF approved a $1 billion Rapid Credit Facility (RCF) to Ghana.
The IMF facility comes with zero interest; with a repayment period of 20 years, and a five-year moratorium.
“The beauty of this is that the rapid credit facility which we went for I think we [Ghana] are the first to have gotten a double quota of a billion dollars and is a zero percent facility, it is 30 years, has 5 and half years moratorium, and it doesn’t come with any conditionalities”, he said.
Ken Ofori-Atta added that all the necessary paper works had already begun, and the $1 billion dollars loan should possibly hit the country’s account at the end of this week.
Meanwhile, an Economist, Dr. Adu Owusu Sarkodie, has cautioned government against a misuse of the Rapid Credit Facility procured from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Dr. Sarkodie warned that the country will pay dearly for the loan in the future if the government misuses the money.
In an interview with Accra based radio station, Citi FM, the Economist advised the Government to make judicious use of the money.
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“We are not in normal times as they said. If they don’t use this fund judiciously, it will come back to haunt us and we will go and pay the loan and not have enough to show for the loan we have contracted.
“So, it’s a question of efficiency, transparency and accountability. We need to make good use of this,” he said.
He further called for stringent measures to be put in place to make sure the IMF loan is used for the intended purposes.
