A cheerful Professor Stephen Adei
In January 2019, Professor Stephen Adei, recently appointed Board Chair of Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), was widely reported to have said any government that puts money in the pocket of lazy citizens is a thief.
On the contrary, Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta via a statement to parliament said, the New Patriotic Party government in which the former GIMPA Rector is serving on about three Boards and committees have put money in the pockets of Ghanaians without any work.
Government has directly or indirectly putting an amount of 12.2 billion cedis into the pockets of many Ghanaians since 2017 through its major initiatives and social interventions, the finance minister told parliament in his budget statement.
Below is how how Prof. Adei was reported to have said…
Any government that puts money in the pockets of its citizens without them working for it, is a thief, Professor Stephen Adei, a former rector of the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), has said.
In his view, the Nana Akufo-Addo-led government has managed the macroeconomics of the country “excellently” and, therefore, people who claim they are not feeling the change in their pockets are people who got monies they neither deserved nor worked for under previous administrations, and are, therefore, complain now that such ill-gotten booties no longer fill their kitty.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with Benjamin Akakpo on the Executive Breakfast Show (EBS) on Class91.3FM, Prof Adei said: “From what I’m seeing, I think they [Akufo-Addo government] have done extremely well in trying to manage the macroeconomics, it’s unbelievable that they have been able to turn around almost every indicator from the negative to the positive.
“People say: ‘We’re not feeling it in our pockets’, but any government that puts money in your pocket without you working for it, is a thief, and yet people say it because people were stealing money. People were getting contracts which they were not working for, and splashing money about, and, therefore, people felt good. But how long can you do that?”
Prof Adei noted that despite the challenges, the Akufo-Addo government’s positives far outweigh the negatives, adding that if the government will continue in the same direction, Ghana will be “better” after the first four years of the current administration.
About The Author
