Mr Yaw Osafo-Maafo, Minister of Finance, Wednesday confirmed to the Trades Union Congress (TUC) that the economy is in a terrible mess with a 41.7 trillion cedis domestic debt to date bequeathed by the NDC government.

The government would therefore spend about 45 per cent of locally generated revenue to pay this internal debt every month, he said. According to the Minister, during the last quarter of the year 2000, money printed into the economy was 900 billion cedis, which fuelled the inflation rate.

Mr Osafo-Maafo made these revelations when he met members of the Steering Committee of the TUC as part of his first ever familiarisation tour of important stakeholders of the economy to interact with them on the state of the economy.

Accompanied by Dr Charles Wereko-Brobby, Energy Advisor to President John Agyekum Kufuor, and officials of his ministry, Mr Osafo-Maafo said the economy has collapsed, and called for collective support and understanding from all Ghanaians to help resuscitate it.

He also confirmed that the NDC government had paid the End-of-Service Benefits (ESB) of all its functionaries to the tune of 3.4 billion cedis and debited it to the budget of the incoming administration.

Mr Osafo-Maafo admitted that the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government was conscious of the miserable plight of Ghanaian workers and would therefore not embark upon any measures to worsen their precarious situation.

He therefore pleaded with the labour movement to bear with the new administration with their demands in order not to over-turn the damaged boat completely.

In the follow-up interactions, the Union leaders raised several pertinent issues on the perceived mismanagement of the various sectors of the economy such as mining, road transport, agriculture and the cocoa industry.

For instance, an official of the Ghana Mines Workers Union (GMWU) expressed concern about the illegal banning of Trade Union activities in the Minerals Commission to the extent that workers were not represented on the Board of Directors, which was dominated by ex-NDC functionaries who dissipated the funds generated by the mining companies.

The Union, he argued, must be allowed to enter there and organise the workers and be represented on the Board to protect the interest of the workers whose sweat generated these funds.

Another official of the General Transport, Petroleum and Chemical Workers Union (GTPCWU) also told the Minister that the Union was against the dubious circumstances surrounding the divestiture of the State Transport Company (STC) to Vanef, a Car Rental Company, and appealed to the Minister to take a critical look at the issue.

Responding, Mr Osafo-Maafo gave the assurance that the issues raised would be examined and effectively addressed by the government. He said he has already started studying certain documents on the divested STC-Vanef and found them to be very intriguing.

The Minister commended the leadership of the TUC for their deep knowledge of the economic issues at stake and pledged to work very closely in solving the problems confronting the nation.

Winding up the discussion, Mr K. Adu-Amankwah, Secretary General of the TUC, thanked the Minister for choosing the TUC as his first place of familiarisation tour of stakeholders.

He expressed satisfaction with the frank discussions and pleaded with the Minister for regular interactions so that they would know how the economy was performing to enable them to guide their members accordingly.