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President John Dramani Mahama yesterday inaugurated the reconstituted Presidential Advisory Group on the Economy (PAGE) at the Jubilee House in Accra.
He charged the eminent economists, industry leaders, and policy experts to help steer the nation away from the “painful setbacks” of repeated debt distress towards a permanent reset of fiscal culture.
The President admitted that despite the discovery of three oil fields and deep capital markets, the country had allowed policy inconsistencies and weak governance to erode hard-won gains.
“We are all qualified and experienced enough to know that we face a tough road ahead, regardless of the progress we may have chalked up to date,” he told the 18-member group.
Present at the ceremony were the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Sumana Bagbin; Chief of Staff, Julius Debrah; Minister of Finance, Ato Forson, and Minister of Education, Haruna Iddrisu, among other senior government officials.
The PAGE members included Ishmael Yamson, economist and private sector player; Kwame Pianim, a former Deputy Minister of Finance; former Deputy Minister for Trade and Industry, Ms Nana Oye Mansa Yeboaa; former Governor of the Bank of Ghana and former Minister for Finance, Dr Kwabena Duffuor, and industrialist, Sir Samuel Esson Jonah.
Other members are former World Bank infrastructure specialist and agribusiness investor, Mr Ato Brown; former Governor of the Bank of Ghana, Dr Henry A. Kofi Wampah; economist and private sector leader, Togbe Afede XIV; Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Stock Exchange, Ms Abena Amoah; Prof. Priscilla Twumasi Baffour, and Prof. Patience Aseweh Abor, both from University of Ghana.
The President admonished them to let their counsel “help us rebuild credibility, restore fiscal discipline, attract investment, re-anchor expectations, and re-establish Ghana as a serious, predictable and competitive economy.”
President Mahama further said that: “As a nation, we find ourselves again in debt distress after having previously declared HIPC and solemnly assuring ourselves that we will never return to such a position.
“That experience should have permanently altered our fiscal culture. Unfortunately, instead, we dissipated significant buffers and stabilisers,” he said.
The President noted that while Ghana had successfully expanded its domestic bond markets, investor confidence had been damaged and citizens forced to endure painful domestic debt haircuts.
He pointed to declining crude oil output at a time when the country should have been consolidating gains, as well as uneven performance of state-owned enterprises, undermined by “weak governance frameworks, political interference and inadequate financial discipline.”
“These are not points of blame, they are lessons in responsibility. Ghana’s economic history teaches us humility. Our task now is correction without amnesia, learning from both our successes and our failures,” President Mahama added.
PAGE, which existed under late President Professor John Evans Atta Mills, and during President Mahama’s first tenure in office, had been expanded and strengthened to reflect the evolving complexity of the national economy.
The new configuration streamlines economic governance by eliminating overlapping structures, including the former Economic Management Team.
The Vice-President, Professor Jane Naana Opoku-Agyemang, a member of PAGE, will chair meetings in the President’s absence.
It would operate alongside the Economic Policy Coordinating Committee (EPCC), jointly chaired by the Finance Minister and the Bank of Ghana Governor.
The President called for “continued coordination among these bodies to achieve efficiency, coherence and cost-effective governance.”
The group’s mandate is wide-ranging and consequential. Members are expected to provide strategic counsel on macroeconomic management, fiscal consolidation, debt sustainability and coherence between fiscal and monetary policy.
PAGE would report directly to the President, and submit advisory memoranda and strategic reviews as and when required. The group would meet at least quarterly, with provision for emergency sessions.
President Mahama disclosed that the constitution of PAGE was guided by three core principles: experience and institutional memory, diversity of expertise, and gender and generational balance.
“Some members of PAGE have served across different administrations, including during my earlier tenure in office.
This continuity is important.
“Experience allows us to sustain what has worked, correct what has failed, and avoid repeating costly mistakes,” he said.
Technical support to PAGE will be provided by the Minister of Finance, the Governor of the Bank of Ghana, the Special Advisor to the President, and the Chairman of the National Development Planning Commission.
