The Minority Leader, Alexander Afenyo-Markin on Wednesday rejected the government’s newly announced reserve accumulation policy, saying it offered little relief to unemployed youth and failed to address the country’s most urgent economic challenges.
The Effutu MP criticised the plan shortly after Finance Minister Cassiel Ato Forson presented details of the Ghana Accelerated National Reserve Accumulation Policy (GANRAP) to parliament.
The policy aims to build Ghana’s international reserves to cover up to 15 months of imports by the end of 2028, largely through large-scale weekly purchases of domestically produced gold.
But Afenyo-Markin said the strategy amounted to economic theorising at a time when many Ghanaians were struggling to find work.
“We are not interested in economic theories,” he told lawmakers, adding that the government had failed to deliver on its flagship job creation promise of “one job, three shifts”.
He challenged the finance ministry to provide concrete data on employment outcomes since the administration took office.
“It has been one year,” he said. “Ghanaians want to know how many jobs have been created, not projections about import cover.”
Forson has argued that the reserve policy is critical to restoring macroeconomic stability, strengthening external buffers and supporting long-term structural transformation after years of currency volatility and high inflation.
Ghana, Africa’s largest gold producer, has faced persistent fiscal pressures and balance-of-payments constraints, prompting the government to prioritise reserve accumulation as part of broader economic reforms.
However, the opposition says long-term financial planning must not come at the expense of immediate social and employment concerns, particularly among young people.
Source: asaaseradio.com
