Running To IMF Doesn’t Mean E-Levy Has Failed – Oppong Nkrumah

Although the government had previously claimed that requesting a bailout from the International Monetary Fund was not an option, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, the minister of information, believes it had no choice but to make the choice.

Mr. Oppong Nkrumah claimed in an interview said that the E-Levy has not performed as well as anticipated thus far because it has encountered fierce opposition.

He clarified that the tax would need time to gain widespread acceptance just like any other method of raising income.

The information minister emphasized that the government needed to act right away to lessen Ghanaians’ suffering while the locally developed solution picks up steam.

He pointed out that the government’s choice to request a bailout from the IMF does not imply that the E-Levy has failed and has to be repealed.

“Why did we intensify townhall meetings in the first place? Because four months after this was proposed, it was still hanging because of some of the scenarios that were happening in Parliament. In this country, [when] we put fiscal policies before Parliament by November, we expect them to be passed by November or December. This makes it pick up and reach optimal levels by the first quarter of the next year. We put the E-Levy before Parliament in November, it took about 4 months for it to be passed, and then we still have the loopholes that we projected to be fixed by the 1st of July,” he said.

According to him, “Whenever you introduce a revenue measure, it takes a while for it to hit its optimal level. Moreso, the E-Levy has had some loopholes that have to be plugged out by the GRA. The Levy has been heavily bastardized, and so people try to avoid it, and so we are unable to get the full value of what we are looking for. We will have to give it room to reach its optimal level. While at it, we cannot wait for it to reach that maximum level because we have obligations to meet.”

On Friday, July 1, 2022, the Ministry of Information declared that President Akufo-Addo had given the go-ahead for Ghana to start negotiations with the IMF for a bailout.
The ministry announced that Ken Ofori-Atta, the minister of finance, will be in charge of negotiating with the IMF in the upcoming days.

Mixed emotions have been expressed in response to the news because it represents a significant U-turn by the government after it made a commitment never to participate in an IMF program.