DALEX CEO SAYS GHANA IS BROKE, CEDI TO FALL TO ₵6.00 TO 1 USD
Kenneth Kwamina Thompson, CEO of Dalex Finance & Leasing made some bold and provocative
predictions about the economy of Ghana in 2015 at a well-attended Chartered Institute of Ghana
(CIMG) event at the Golden Tulip Hotel on Wednesday evening. He announced “Govt. of Ghana is broke
and that is what the Bank of Ghana told all of us in its report of the Monetary Policy Committee meeting
of November 2014”. Anyone who regularly spends more than his income is broke. He complained “we
spend 43% of our income paying public servants who are less than 10% of our population. We continue
to spend over 70% of our revenue servicing debt and on the Single Spine Salary Structure.”
Another contrary prediction was that even though the IMF bailout deal will be signed this quarter, the
bailout money will be delayed due to the Government missing its targets set in the front loaded IMF
Conditionalities. Kwamina said “the IMF will not accept any ‘kpa-kpa-kpa’ figures. We have made
missing budget targets a national art form in recent years”.
His predictions on Ghana Govt. Borrowing were that the Fiscal Indiscipline will continue, T-Bill Rates
could rise to 37% and inflation surge to 25%. He said that Ghana’s borrowing had reached unsustainable
levels at 61% of GDP at the end of 2014.
He went on to claim very provocatively that the Cedi will fall to GH₵ 6.00 = US$1.00. He attributed the
predicted fall of the cedi to be due to the overall appreciation of the US Dollar to almost all major
currencies and the continued love of Ghanaians for things foreign. Kwamina said “Let the Cedi fall. The
overvalued currency robs the country of jobs as we stop local production because foreign goods are
cheaper.”