The total public debt has reached GH¢291.6 billion representing 76.1% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at the end of December 2020, an increase from GH¢122 billion which represents 56.9% of GDP in 2016.
This was contained in the 2021 budget statement and economic policy of the Government delivered by the caretaker Finance Minister, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu in Parliament on Friday, March 12.
He blamed the debt stock on some non-recurrent burdens.
“Included in the debt stock and the debt/GDP ratio at the end of 2020 are the following non-recurrent burdens that the Government had to deal with as matter of urgency”; the physical impact of COVID-19, which is GH¢19.7 billion, the cost of the financial sector clean-up, which is GH¢21 billion, and the cost of excess capacity charges paid to Independent Power Producers (IPPs), which is also GH¢12 billion.
“If these expenditures are excluded and the drop in GDP growth in 2020, primarily attributable to COVID-19, is taken into account, the total stock of debt for 2020 would have been approximately GH¢239.9 billion, implying a dent to GDP ratio of 58.7%.”
He said, the total debt stock mix was made up of a provisional figure of GH¢141,780.60 million for external debt and GH¢149,833.89 million for domestic debt, accounting for approximately 48.6 percent and 51.4 percent of the total public debt stock, respectively.
As a percentage of GDP, external and domestic debt represented 36.99 percent and 39.09 percent, respectively.
The Leader of Government Business said, between 2004 and 2008, Ghana’s debt stock increased by 30%, between 2008 and 2012, the debt stock increased by 269%, between 2012 and 2016, the increase in the debt stock was 243%, and between 2016 and 2020, the increase in Ghana’s debt stock was 137%.
Story By: Edzorna Francis Mensah