Monitor budgets to agencies- Kyei-Mensah to C’ttees of Parliament

Majority Leader, Osei Kyei-Mensah Bonsu has urged Committees of Parliament to monitor and track budgets allocated to various agencies, departments and all sectors of the economy solely to guarantee Ghanaians prudent management and value for money pertaining to the expenditures being recorded on their behalf.

He made the call during a post 2022 budget statement workshop ahead of debates in Ho on Saturday November 20, 2021.

The Parliamentary Affairs Minister and Suame Lawmaker also expressed disappointment that it is worrying that below 10% of the total working population in Ghana are registered tax payers.

He wondered how the central government is able to meet its revenue targets to undertake development projects with the impressive statistics in place.

Speaking at a post 2022 budget workshop in the Volta regional capital Ho over the weekend, the Suame Lawmaker said the government has failed to raise adequate domestic revenue to develop Ghana.

“Our inability to raise enough domestics revenue to meet government expenditure with less than 10% of the total working class registered as tax payers, how can the government implement policies and programmes to improve the living conditions of Ghanaian people.

“This is quite worrying and requires urgent steps to correct same.”

He noted that “Another area that requires attention is efficiency in government spending. Higher budgetary allocation alone may not translate into social and economic outcomes unless specific measures are implemented to correct the underlining inefficiency in spending to ensure prudent management.

“Here, I believe the committees of Parliament are required, as I keep saying, to trace and track the allocations that are made to the various sectors of the economy in order to assure out country men and women that indeed, there is value for money in the expenditures that are made on behalf of the people of this country.”

At the same forum, the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu, said that his side in Parliament will not support the controversial E-levy policy proposal in the 2022 budget statement.

According to him, the levy serves as a disincentive for the growth of digital economy.

He said “Mr Speaker, understandably, we see that the Minister of Finance seeks to introduce some measures including the now popularly declared e-levy or digital levy as some have quite named it.

“Mr Speaker, our concern is whether the e-levy itself is not and will not be a disincentive to the growth of digital economy in our country. We are convinced that the e-levy may as well even be a disincentive to investment and a disincentive to private sector development in our country.

“We in the minority may not and will not support government with the introduction of that particular e-levy . We are unable to build national consensus on that particular matter.”

The introduction of the levy attracted concerns among a section of Ghanaians.

Apart from the Minority Caucus of Parliament led by Haruna Iddrisu who has revealed his side will not approve the 1.75% mobile money, the momo tax has received a backlash from many who believe the decision is perverse, awkward, founded on little or no basis to tax one’s capital instead of income reffered to as double-taxation to burden the poor.

Source: africaneditors.com