The governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) has called on the Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta to review the domestic debt exchange programme.
According to Justin Frimpong Kodua, the General Secretary of the party, many members are not happy about the programme.
Justin Koduah, according to a report by Citi FM, in a meeting with the Finance Minister and other party leaders said the party’s headquarters has been inundated with calls for government to consider the debt exchange programme.
This call by the party comes after the Majority Leader, Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu shared a similar opinion last week.
Speaking with a group of individual bondholders led by convener, Senyo Hosi and private legal practitioner Martin Kpebu after a petition to exclude individual bondholders from the debt exchange was presented to him on Friday, the Suame MP called on the Finance Minister to properly engage with major stakeholders.
“What we [are] talking about is that many of these bondholders also belong to the middle class and that’s where the major worry is. If we are wiping away the middle class, that could be dangerous, so we need to have some further dialogue on this.
“Government thinks that this is the best way forward, however, even if it is, we need to engage, reflect and then move on and that will encourage some people who have some doubt to better appreciate where we are.”
“Nothing can substitute for discussions, round table discussions and engagements wherever we find ourselves in. I think it’s important that we go back to the drawing table to have engagements with the major stakeholders… All of us are in it. And if we don’t manage it well, we’ve gone through this before, way back some 25, 30 years ago and repositioning was a major, major difficulty”, he added.
The government has extended the deadline for bondholders to voluntarily exchange their bonds for new ones for the third time.
It is currently unclear how many institutions or individuals have signed onto the programme which has been rejected by several groups.
Pulse
