Will Dr Kwesi Botchwey Be Allowed To “Sell Poor Ghana” to ‘Capitalists’?
By Otchere Darko

Re: “Kwesi Botchwey leads IMF talks”; [Ghanaweb General News of Tuesday, 9 September 2014; Original Source: Daily Guide].

I was very pleased to learn that President Mahama has selected former Finance Minister, Dr Kwesi Botchey, to lead Ghana’s economic team that will hold talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on the government’s decision to seek a bail out from one of the two Breton Wood institutions.

My knowledge of Dr Botchey dates back to the Nineteen-Seventies when he taught me at the then School of Administration of University of Ghana. His brilliance was unquestionable. His eloquence and power of persuasion could match those of Shakespeare’s Mark Anthony in Julius Caesar. BUT, his extreme ‘hatred’ of the West and capitalism was always boldly written on his ever-smiling face and in his constantly ‘rumbling-on’ mouth, despite the fact that, even in those days, he was driving a flashy American sports car. During lecture hours, and without any relevant Westerners’ cheating or imperialistic predisposition to form a link and the basis for his criticisms, he (Dr Botchey) would always use about fifteen to twenty minutes of lecture time to digress and vociferously attack the West, its institutions, such as the IMF, and capitalism. Thanks to God, students in his class rarely failed his subjects.... perhaps, as a result of his power of communication and the efficacy of his lecture delivery.

Years after leaving Legon as a lecturer and moving abroad to widen his experience, Dr Botchey returned to Ghana, ‘politically mature’, helped by his ‘age’ and his foreign experience. Accordingly, he ‘seemed’ to have learnt to tone down his anti-West and anti-capitalist rhetoric; and seemed, accordingly, to have shifted [and rightly so] from his extreme leftist ideas; and moved towards the ‘centre’ of political thinking. His improved political personality, resulting from his political metamorphosis, strengthened his brilliance and added practical value to his immense wealth of ‘theoretical’ knowledge.

Thus, when ‘domfo -kumfo’ Jerry John Rawlings appointed him to become his finance minister in the Nineteen Eighties, the new Dr Botchey showed Ghanaians the true benefit that is derivable from staying at the centre of politics and avoiding all tendencies for socialists to express ‘extremist sentiments’, even where they have their backs pressed to the wall. The innovative “forex bureaus” Dr Botchey created in the Nineteen Eighties to provide State-approved source for private foreign currency transactions became a ‘blessing’ for Mr Rawlings’ Ghana, at a time when the ‘darling military adventurist’, who walked the streets of Accra banging heads together with his ‘I –can-change-Ghana’ rhetoric, and who always “boomed” loudly, was beginning to understand the Ghanaian proverb that said “abofra ‘asoannteasem’ tesi nsuo mu, ansa na wahu se emu dow dodo ma no”..... which, literarily translated into English, means: “a disobedient child jumps into a river before he realises that it is too deep for him [to swim].”

Dr Kwesi Botchey’s contribution to the economic and financial development of Ghana in the Nineteen Eighties could, [up to that time], be only matched by that of Mr K. A. Gbedemah of Dr Kwame Nkrumah’s First Republic. I strongly believe that the new centre-left Nkrumahist (Dr Botchey), who is different from the extreme political leftist who taught me in the Nineteen Seventies, is a good choice to lead Ghana’s team for the IMF talks. *I, therefore, have no illusion, whatsoever, that he can, and will strike the best possible deal that is extractable from IMF for Mother Ghana. These are the reasons why I felt happy when I read about his appointment.

The main question I have with the whole idea of seeking a “bail out”, as well as with his (Dr Botchey’s) appointment to lead the negotiating team, is simply this: Will he (Dr Botchey) be given the freedom he needs to deal with an institution that is constantly seen and attacked as “pro-West” and “pro-capitalists” by several Ghanaian socialists sitting on the extreme right of Ghana’s political divide? My other concern is whether the man (President Mahama) who appointed him (Dr Botchey) to lead the “bail out talks” understands the difficult job that faces him and his team members, given that the president is reportedly planning to re-establish a National Airline that has twice previously failed the nation abysmally. Do the extremists at the far-right of Ghana’s politics, and the President himself, know the long and bumpy ‘road’ that Dr Botchey and his team-members are going to travel along before, hopefully, they may manage to get IMF to “bail out” Ghana, with obviously unavoidable strings of ‘dos and don’ts’ attached to it to ‘immobilise’ the government that sought for the “bail out” in the first place? I believe, for example, that Ghana is going to be ‘ordered’ to privatise many currently-operating public business entities that are failing. So, how on earth can Dr Botchey and his team get the IMF to agree to an idea of re-establishing a twice-failed National Airline? *I fear that the extreme rightists inside and outside NDC will sooner or later start to ‘boom’ and ‘scream’ at him (Dr Botchey), shouting and chanting: “DON’T SELL POOR GHANA TO PRO-IMPERIALIST WEST AND ITS PRO-CAPITALIST IMF.” That may force a president who seems not to appreciate the magnitude of the task he has assigned to the leaned economist and financial expert (Dr Botchey). They (the extreme political ideologues inside and outside NDC) will certainly ‘boom’ and ‘scream’. But, will those ‘booms’ and ‘screams’ influence President Mahama and members of his government? This is the question that bothers me.

If we (Ghanaians) don’t want Ghana to be ‘sold’ to, or dictated-to by the so-called “imperialistic capitalist West”, then we need to ‘grow up’ politically and stop squandering the nation’s wealth through wanton acts of extreme and uncontrolled corruption and inefficiency. As long as we continue to be corrupt and inefficient, Ghana will continue to slide down and face the constant risk of being in need of external financial support and “bail out”. And as long as we (Ghanaians) seek external financial “bail outs”, *our lenders, irrespective of whether they are from China and Russia or from the West, will always dictate the terms of payment of whatever loan or “bail out” we seek from them. *Our lenders will also be in a position to tell us how we should run our economy. Worst of all, *our lenders will have the audacity to tell us which of our national assets they want to hold and control as “collateral security” against any loan or any form of “bail out” we seek from them. We may feel bad and unhappy about that, but that is what we can get when we ‘make’ ourselves ‘beggars’. “A beggar has no choice,” an English proverb unambiguously tells us.

If we don’t want IMF and other Western institutions to run our economy for us on their terms, then we must stop ‘looting’ and ‘chop-chopping’ our resources, and start from NOW to make realistic efforts, as a nation, to manage our macro and microeconomic affairs better and more sensibly than we have done in the past. We cannot eat our cake and still have it. Changing our corrupt and inefficient disposition that has been, and continues to be the nemesis of Ghana’s economic failure and its dependency on external loans and “bail-outs” is the right thing for us to do.

In the meantime, it is my wish that he (Dr Kwesi Botchey) will be allowed to discharge the important national duty assigned to him, so as to be able to save our nation from what has now become known in Ghana as the “the sinking ship”, which is a ‘national metaphor’ stamped on the lips of every Ghanaian, and which is deemed to mean “total failure”.

*Fail to secure for us the needed “bail out deal”, Dr Botchey, and Ghana “sinks”. *Succeed to secure this badly needed “bail out deal” which, without doubt, will be on the terms of IMF, and you (Dr Botchey) will be accused by several Ghanaians for having “sold our poor country” to one of the most hated international financial institutions in the world by Ghanaians and, thereby, for having caused an upsurge in cost of living in Ghana, a price we (Ghanaians) cannot escape paying, as borrowers seeking “bail out” from as IMF that we view a Shylock. What a typical ‘chatch-22’ political syndrome! Nevertheless, the indomitable Dr Kwesi Botchey has a job to do to rescue his country. I say good luck to him.