- “I think it's [salary cut] absolutely necessary. The question I have is ‘why it took them too long to do that?’ This should have been done during the height of the COVID because it was clear that the economy was going to be constricted. "
Professor Emmanuel Gyimah-Boadi, the chair of the governing board of Afrobarometer and co-founder of the Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana), has said the decision by the government to cut the salary of ministers and heads of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) is not a populist approach.
Speaking with Kent Mensah on Sunday Night on Asaase Radio, Prof Gyimah-Boadi said, “It’s not a populist approach. I think it may have been symbolic but those were important symbolic measures for a government that is imposing some kind of austerity measure on the population or a government that was imposing additional taxes on the population.”
Economic implications
He said: “I think it’s [salary cut] absolutely necessary. The question I have is, why it took them too long to do that? This should have been done during the height of the COVID because it was clear that the economy was going to be constricted.”
“It was clear that government revenue was going to suffer because economic activities had basically come to a halt during the pandemic … we should have understood the economic implications of that, the revenue implications of that and that government was going to need to ask citizens to make sacrifices to pay taxes and maybe introduce E-Levy,” Prof Gyimah-Boadi said.
He added: “They should have prepared the grounds for that, politically, psychologically and cutting back on government expenditure, cutting back on their own purse would have been an important symbolical measure. If those things had been done, I bet some of the outcries over E-Levy would have been averted.”
Watch the full interview below:
Cabinet earlier approved a proposal that ministers and the heads of SOEs contribute 30% of the salary they earn between April and December 2022 to the Consolidated Fund.
Members of the Council of State have also agreed to a 20% cut to their monthly allowance for the next year to support efforts aimed at stabilising the economy.
The Minister for Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, has said the government will save about GHC3.5 billion from the 30% salary cut of ministers and heads of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) among other measures.
Asaase Radio 99.5 – tune in or log on to broadcasts online
99.5 in Accra, 101.5 in Bawku, 99.9 in Bimbilla, 100.3 in Cape Coast, 90.7 in Ho, 98.5 in Kumasi, 99.7 in Tamale, 89.5 in Tarkwa and 106.9 in Walewale
Join the conversation. Call: 020 000 9951 or 059 415 7777. Or WhatsApp: 020 000 0995.
#AsaaseRadio
#TheVoiceofOurLand
