A former Finance Minister, Dr Kwabena Duffuor, has proposed the establishment of a National Economic Rescue Team to help find immediate and lasting solutions to the current economic challenges. He said the depth of the economic crisis and the ongoing attempt to restructure the domestic debt towards macroeconomic stability and recovery of the economy call for the establishment of an ...

The Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, has hailed the Staff-level Agreement with the International Monetary Fund for a new three-year arrangement under the Extended Credit Facility (ECF) of about US$3 billion. The agreement was reached after several months of talks between Ghanaian government officials and authorities of the IMF. Addressing Journalists at a press conference on Tuesday, Mr. Ofori-Atta said the ...

Indonesia’s parliament has approved a new criminal code that bans anyone in the country from having extramarital sex and restricts political freedoms. Sex outside marriage will carry a jail term of up to a year under the new laws, which take effect in three years. The raft of changes come after a rise in religious conservatism in the Muslim-majority country. ...

The Minority in Parliament has rejected plans by the government to increase government machinery personnel by 1,570 people. The group says this number is contained in the 2023 budget statement. The Minority said it is unacceptable to increase government machinery staff to 3,681 at a time when there is an announced freeze on public sector employment. The passage of the ...

Ghana’s government has taken inadequate steps to end the chaining and inhumane treatment of people with real or perceived mental health conditions – psychosocial disabilities – in faith-based and traditional healing centers despite a 2017 ban on such treatment, Human Rights Watch said today. A decade after the adoption of the 2012 Mental Health Act, which establishes a structure to ...

The West African Examination Council (WAEC) has released provisional results for the 2022 West Africa Secondary School Certificate Examination (WASSCE). In a statement on Thursday, WAEC said the results relate to only Ghanaian students who took part in the exams this year. According to the examination body, candidates can access the results on its website. However, some 8,486 candidates who ...

A record $51.5 billion is needed to help 230 million of the world’s most vulnerable people in nearly 70 countries next year, the UN said on Thursday. The size of the appeal – 25 per cent higher than this year’s – reflects the fact that the total number in need is 65 million more than in 2022, the UN and partner ...

The Internal Monetary Fund (IMF) has confirmed that the government of Ghana has declared its intention to conduct a debt operation ( also called debt restructuring) in 2023. According to an update on the fund’s website, “authorities [Ghana] have assessed their public debt as being unsustainable over the medium term. Together with efforts to bring the government deficit down, they ...

Ghana has been downgraded deeper into junk territory by Moody’s Investors Service on the likelihood that private creditors will incur steep losses during the government’s planned debt restructuring. The country’s credit rating was slashed by two levels to Ca, the second-lowest score at Moody’s, according to a Tuesday statement. That puts Ghana on par with Sri Lanka, which is in ...

The Minority in Parliament has described the 2023 budget statement and economic policy presented by the Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, yesterday to Parliament as not encouraging as it provides no hope for the youth because there will be a freeze on employment. It has, therefore, urged the citizenry to brace themselves up for a “maximum hardship” in the coming ...