Moses Asaga, the minority spokesperson On Finance, has criticized this year’s budget saying it lacks focus. According to him, the budget does not contain the necessary ingredients for economic growth and “is also not well-focused because it is more like a ‘Kwashiorkor’ (malnourished) budget.”

The budget, he says, addressed too many issues, which is not good for planning. Mr. Asaga noted that the targets set by government especially the projected Gross Domestic Growth of 4.5 per cent are woefully inadequate to stimulate growth saying that the country needs a growth rate of eight per cent to enable it become a middle income country.

He also described the projected growth rate of 4.7 per cent for the agricultural sector, 4.1 per cent for industry and 4.7 per cent for services as not too attractive targets for economic growth.

According to Mr. Asaga, the NDC administration attained growth level of 6.4 per cent for the agricultural sector in 1997 and 5.6 per cent in 1999 and if the NPP government that prides itself with on accelerating the pace of national development has set targets of below five per cent, then the country has a long way to go.

The former Deputy Finance Minister kicked against what he termed the idea of paying economic tariffs for utilities and said this will have far reaching effects on the cost of production.

For his part, Minority Leader, Alban Bagbin described the statement as a modest continuation of projects initiated by the former government. He said budgetary allocations for the priority areas and projections made for the various sectors show that the budget is meant to stabilize the economy and not to accelerate growth as is being preached by the NPP.