The Institute of Progress Governance (IPG) has described President Mahama's 2025 budgetary statement, which the finance minister read on his behalf, as filled with lamentations.

Reacting to the 2025 budgetary statement presented by the finance minister, the Executive Director of IPG, Dr. George Domfe, emphasized that the budget failed to give Ghanaians hope and that it is filled with lamentations.

“The finance minister created the impression that the Ghanaian economy was run aground by the erstwhile Akufo-Addo administration. The minister also lamented about what he termed as an alarming rate of unemployment left behind by the Akufo-Addo administration” he stated.

“Data from the Bank of Ghana and the Ministry of Finance provide a very different picture. Nana Akufo-Addo left the economy growing at 5.7% in 2024 whereas Mr. Mahama left it growing at 3.4% in 2016. On unemployment, Mahama left an official unemployment rate (using a narrow measure) of 5.2% and President Akufo-Addo reduced it to 3% by the end of the year 2023.

“Whilst acknowledging that unemployment is still a problem, Dr. Domfe commended Ghana Statistical Service for using a broad measure to recently capture unemployment at 14.7%. He quickly added, "It is wrong for President Mahama and the NDC ministers to use the 2016 narrow measure of 5.2% to compare to the 2023 broad measure of 14.7%. I don't expect the President to make such basic mistakes!” he added.

“On Budget Deficit, the NDC left it at 9.0% on a cash basis in 2016 whereas the NPP left it at 5.2% (on a cash basis) and 7.9% (on a commitment basis) in 2024. "This renders NPP performance as superior” he explained.

Dr. Domfe also indicated that NPP again performed better with the Gross External Reserves. "Whilst NDC left it at 2.8-month import cover (about $6.1 billion), NPP left a 4-month import cover (about $ 8.98 billion). "The difference is clear in terms of who managed the economy better" he explained.

On debt to GDP, the IPG boss indicated that Mahama left the figure at 73.3% (in 2006 constant prices) in 2016 with Ghana’s debt being unsustainable. The country was plunged into a debt crisis in 2014 and in April 2015, we quickly ran to IMF for external credibility.

Dr. Domfe explained that while Ghana’s debt had remained unsustainable since 2020, the country is now out of danger with a debt-to-GDP of 61.8% at the end of 2024.

The Development Economist and Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Social Policy Studies (CSPS) at the College of Humanities, University of Ghana, concluded that President Mahama’s claim of the economy having been criminally managed is, therefore, untrue.

“Looking at the data which is verifiable from the Bank of Ghana, Finance Ministry and the IMF, President Mahama’s claim that the economy was criminally managed is far from the truth” the IPG boss concluded.

Watch the latest edition of BizTech below:



Click here to follow the GhanaWeb Business WhatsApp channel