[ 2017-02-20 ]

Kwesi Pratt Jnr., Managing Editor of the Insight newspaper

Heritage Fund is 'useless & unproductive' - Kwesi Pratt
Kwesi Pratt Jnr. has labeled the Heritage Fund as
a 'useless unproductive enterprise'.

According to him, it doesn't make sense for the
leaders of the country to store up money for
future generations while the nation suffers.

Speaking on Radio Gold's 'Alhaji and Alhaji'
programme, monitored by Peacefmonline.com, Kwesi
Pratt asked "how foolish" can the nation be to put
and save money in the Heritage Fund with an
interest rate of 2 percent.

He wondered why the Fund is being preserved for
the future, meanwhile the leaders are borrowing
from the international communities at an interest
rate of 10%, to help improve the economy.

“You take your money, hard-earned money, and you
put it in a fund and you’re earning 2% on it.
And you say that that money is so important that
you won’t touch it. You need money now and you
say that you won’t touch it because look, it’s
so important for future generations. You won’t
touch it. Meanwhile, you need money to do things
now which will provide your people with a better
future, Infrastructural development, education and
so on. So, what do you do?

“You go to the market and you borrow in order to
meet those challenges today. You’re borrowing at
an interest rate of 10% and investing your money
which you could have used and gaining 2%. How
foolish can you be? I mean how foolish can you be?
It doesn’t make sense at all.”

To him, the wisest thing for the Government of
Ghana to do is to tap from the Fund to resolve the
challenges confronting Ghanaians and stop "keeping
money in a box".

"Future generations will tell us that we were
absolutely wrong," he stressed.

“Simple economics will teach us that keeping
money in a box or in a fund for future generations
to come and use is a useless unproductive
enterprise. So, I was opposed to the establishment
of that so-called Heritage Fund from the very
beginning. It doesn’t make sense. But we’ve
agreed to establish this Heritage Fund. Somehow,
all of us were conned into believing that it will
provide some security for future generations.
I’ve no problem with that. It’s our collective
error and we will live by it," he added.

Source - peacefmonline.com

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