The National Communications Officer of the main opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Sammy Gyamfi, has challenged the governing New Patriotic Party’s (NPP) constant attribution of the country’s economic mess to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mr Gyamfi has asked what the NPP would have attributed the economic mess the county finds itself in to, had COVID-19 not happened.

“Quite often all you hear from the NPP and its elements is when issues about the mismanagement of the economy are raised... you hear them say the economy was doing well but for COVID,” he noted.

He charged the NPP to be bold in admitting that before the pandemic, the country’s economy was in shambles.

He said before COVID, there were signs Ghana’s economy was having challenges all because of mismanagement on the part of Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta.

The NDC’s communications officer spoke on the mid-day news on Accra 100.5 FM on Wednesday, April 5, 2023.

“The NPP is quick to shift the blame on the mismanagement of the economy unto COVID when there were signs the economy was being run down before the advent of the COVID pandemic,” he asserted.

“In 2019, the cedi depreciated against the US dollar by 14 per cent and this was before COVID,” he buttressed.

“The World Bank’s Country Director, Mr Piere Laporte, said without mincing words that the country’s economy showed signs of challenges before the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic,” he cited, remarking that: “COVID-19 seems to have been NPP’s scapegoat.”

Reacting to the NPP National Chairman’s press conference, yesterday, he said: “Mr Stephen Ayensu Ntim's mannerisms at the conference clearly shows that pressure was being bought to bare on him from some powers high up to speak when he had nothing to say.”