Ghana Safe for Investment President Tells Africa Chief Executive Officers

By Times Reporter

President Akufo-Addo (arrowed), President Alassane Ouattara and President Emerson Mnangagwa exchanging pleasantries with a section of participants

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has assured business investors of the government's commitment to provide the necessary security for their investments, if they chose to invest in Ghana.

Addressing the 6th Africa Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) Forum, held in Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire yesterday, President Akufo-Addo stressed that Ghana was endowed with great potential and had the right political and legal environment to provide security for investments.

President Akufo-Addo noted that over the last 14 months, the period of stay of his government in office, his administration had focused its energies on trying to build a resilient economy, and put in measures aimed at helping move Ghana to a situation beyond aid.

With some degree of success, President Akufo-Addo told the Forum that "we have put in place, in Ghana, since I took office, a monetary policy that has stabilised our currency, and has reduced significantly inflation and the cost of borrowing."

He added that "we have implemented a raft of tax cuts which has brought relief to businesses, and, at the same time, reduced substantially our fiscal deficit. These interventions are lowering the cost of doing business, and are shifting the focus of our economy from an emphasis on taxation to an expansion of production."

President Akufo-Addo stated that the Ghanaian economy, whose growth rate stood at 3.6 per cent in 2016, the lowest in two decades, grew by 7.9 per cent in 2017, and was expected to grow, in 2018, by 8.3 per cent, which, according to the IMF, would make it the fastest growing economy in the world this year.

In order to create a Ghana that is "able to mobilise our own material and human resources to develop a strong economy, capable of generating prosperity for the mass of our people, and construct a Ghana no longer dependent on handouts and charity," the President stated that the rapid growth of the private sector was an essential ingredient in realising his government's vision of a Ghana Beyond Aid.

"There are many projects in roads, railways, water transport, industry, manufacturing, agriculture, petroleum and gas, renewable energy, the exploitation of our mineral wealth of bauxite, iron ore and gold, and ICT, amongst others, which, if properly structured, can attract private sector financing," he said.

"Key to attracting private sector investment is not only creating a conducive, business friendly and peaceful environment, but, also, fashioning state machinery fit to provide strong, regulatory support for private enterprise to thrive. That, for us, is the heart of the private-public-partnership that can fast-track our development."

The President indicated that the aim of his government was to create state machinery that can manage efficiently its fiscal and monetary responsibilities that could reform its tax administration to ensure that all private sector operators discharge their full tax obligations to enhance domestic resource mobilisation, and that could promote the rule of law.

"It is important that all of us make systematic efforts to turn our backs on the sad history of massive flights of capital out of our country and continent from unconscionable inter-company pricing and other practices, and lay the conditions for fairness in the administration of our economies," he added.

He told the Forum, comprising African CEOs, bankers and investors that Ghana wanted to participate in the global market place "not on the basis of the exports of raw materials, but on the basis of things we make. We want to bring greater dignity to the lives of millions of people in Ghana. We want to build a Ghana Beyond Aid."

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