The Ministry of Finance is finalizing plans to provide payroll support for eight state-owned enterprises (SOES) whose operations have been disrupted by the COVID-19 restrictions.
Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta who disclosed this in Accra yesterday said an assessment of the impact of the pandemic on 28 SOEs had revealed that as many as 19 of them are projected to post losses of up to one point 55 billion Ghana cedis for 2020.
He said entities such as Metro Mass Transit, Intercity STC and DVLA recorded revenue declines of over 62,000 and 71%, respectively between March and April this year.
Mr. Ofori-Atta said at the opening of the State Interests and Governance Authority 2020 policy and Governance Forum in Accra, he indicated that this year’s policy and governance forum came at an important time when COVID-19 had presented both unprecedented challenges and new opportunities which must be surmounted and leveraged to ensure the long-term commercial viability and sustainability of institutions.
According to him, there was no denying that since the pandemic reached the country’s shores there had been disruptions to corporate and general business confidence, coupled with the associated threats to projected revenues, profitability, liquidity and corporate growth of SOEs joint venture companies and other states entities.
The Minister in Charge of SIGA, Dr. Kweku Afriyie said being able to transmit the right signals was always important but even more so when the global economy faced headwinds as a result of the ripple effects of the COVID-19 which had crippled every facet of the economy, health, education, energy and technology.
