The Flagbearer of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Akufo Addo has assured members of the Ghana Employers Association (GEA) that his administration will maintain macroeconomic stability and restore fiscal discipline if voted into power.
According to him, the current economic conditions in the country is stifling the private sector as cost of borrowing goes up, affecting incomes of employees across the country.
Speaking at the Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the Ghana Employers Association, Nana Akufo Addo stated that he will prioritize the industry and agriculture sectors to create more jobs if voted into power as president.
“A future NPP government, God willing will focus on four key areas which include building a strong resilient economy by restoring macroeconomic stability and ensuring discipline,” he said.
He pointed out that the industry and agriculture sectors will be given priorities, revitalizing activities to create jobs for the mass unemployed youth.
“These sectors provide the bases for Ghana to add value to its natural resources and optimize its comparative and competitive advantage in regional and global trade,” he said.
Nana Addo pointed out that the only way to build the country is to pursue a self reliance policy and implement aggressive targeted infrastructure development programmes.
“Regrettably, there is been recently a decline in the Ghanaian economy characterized by slow and stunted growth , high levels of unsustainable debt , high inflation, high interest rates and a weak and unstable currency,” he said.
He added that high cost of borrowing, and high cost of electricity tariff have rendered businesses unproductive.
According to him, the current macroeconomic indicators are all a testimony of how businesses are suffocating under high cost of production inputs.
“Some of the specific policy intervention is to shift the focus of the economic policy from taxation to production, removing import duties on raw materials within the contest of the ECOWAS External Tariff,” he said.
He stated that government will remove a number of taxes which include the structural import levy, abolish the 17.5 percent VAT on imported drugs, abolish 17.5 percent VAT on real estate house, reduce corporate income tax rate from 25 percent to 20 percent.
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