The communication bureau of the major opposition party, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), in the Ashanti Region is predicting doom for the country as members have cautioned Ghanaians to brace up for more taxes in Wednesday’s budget.
Director of Communications Abass Nurudeen while speaking on Akoma FM‘s current affairs and political show GhanAkoma Tuesday, November 16 explained that “from all indications there’s no hope in [Wednesday]’s budget which Ken Ofori-Atta will be addressing the nation at the Parliament House because the NPP has shown little empathy or concerns to the plight of Ghanaians.”
He further cited the Vice President’s speech in 2016 in which, according to Abass, “Dr Bawumia promised to turn Ghana’s fortunes from taxation to production, but now the opposite is what we are experiencing”.
The leader of the NDC communication team in Ashanti Region told host of the show Aduanaba Kofi Asante Ennin that “we have done our checks and made our assessments and we are reliably informed that God willing [on Wednesday] the Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta will introduce more taxes and even increase the rates of existing ones”.
He later advised Ghanains to position themselves well, live within their means to cut down costs and wastes to stay afloat in the coming hard times.
The said edition of GhanAkoma also empaneled Ralphael Sarfo Patrick, the Deputy National TESCON Coordinator, and Awuni Akyereba, a Forensic Chartered Accountant.
Ralphael Sarfo Patrick countered Abass’ claims and explained that “although taxes are the major means of revenue mobilisation of every economy, NPP government will not be insensitive to Ghanaians. We understand them and know exactly what they need so [Wednesday]’s budget will be a hope for Ghanaians especially the youth to tap into its benefits”.
He further explained that “clearly, there are already existing taxes which the people have been complaining although when we came into power we abolished several nuisance taxes which the NDC introduced, yet there are other several ones to be reviewed and dealt with”.
Ralphael Sarfo Patrick, who is also aspiring for the NPP’s regional Youth Organizer position, appealed to Ghanaians to discard the claims of the NDC because “they always play politics with everything. To score cheap political points, the NDC will go to every extent to run you down, whenever NPP is in power the economy thrives. We are the best managers of the economy.
“But for Covid-19 which has brought hardship to the world Ghana would have been one of the most attractive economy but even in the midst of Covid-19 we will never introduce draconian taxes as exaggerated by the NDC”.
Source:3news.com