[ 2014-11-26 ]

Dr Akoto Osei rallies support to reject 2015 budget
Minority spokesperson on finance, Dr. Anthony
Akoto Osei is championing a crusade in Parliament
to get the 2015 budget rejected by the House.

The Member of Parliament for Old Tafo, for
instance cited the failure of government to remit
workers contributions to the pensions fund as
stipulated under the Pensions Act as one of the
reasons why the budget should not be approved.

According to him, information available to him
suggests that the government has not transferred
the deducted amount into the appropriate kitty
since the beginning of 2014. This, he said, is a
violation of the Pensions Act.

The Pensions Act stipulates that if an employer
fails to transfer workers’ contributions within
14 days from the end of each month it would be
liable to a 3% penalty.

Early this month, Joy News intercepted a report by
the National Pensions Regulatory Authority (NPRA)
to Parliament revealing that government through
the Controller and Accountant General has failed
to transfer more than 200 million cedis of
workers’ pension contributions to the designated
Bank of Ghana account.

Dr. Akoto Osei also argued that the budget should
not be approved because the government failed to
achieve all the targets it set for itself in
2014.

The MP decried the rising inflation and the
increasing public debt and appealed to his
colleagues to reject the budget many have
described as an austere budget.

For 2014, the government predicted an inflation
target of 9.5 percent, plus or minus 2 percentage
points. Government also targeted economic growth
of 8 percent in 2014 as well as to trim its budget
deficit to 8.5 percent of gross domestic product.

But the Ghana Statistical Service announced that
inflation for October 2014 has hit 16.9 percent.

Source - Joy News

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