The President of IMANI Africa, Franklin Cudjoe says the newly designated ministers will not have a significant impact on the economy.
According to him, some of the new ministers will be preoccupied with re-election campaigns, and by the time they settle into their positions, they will only have four or five months left in office.
Speaking on the AM Show, he stated that although some of the ministers, such as Dr Bernard Okoe Boye have a good record in the health sector, he is unsure of what impact he can make in this limited period.
“What exactly can he do? Except of course, he can do something he himself talks about when it comes to exporting doctors and nurses abroad which he thinks will be a significant value for foreign exchange in the country. And even that has to be within the broader policy of the government.”
Mr. Cudjoe stated that the realignment and cutting back of the ministries is the most crucial part of the reshuffle.
He argued that if the president had realigned and cut back on the number of ministries, Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia would not have been able to make any new promises to the people.
“It makes me think that Bawumia will have to tell us exactly how his 50 member ministerial portfolio would look like because that is useful, including John Mahama who says 60,” he said.
Mr. Cudjoe added that the leader of the Movement for Change, Alan Kyerematen has already prepared his budget for 2025.
He believes that this indicates that Mr. Kyerematen is positioning himself to run for president in the next election.
“I like to see it. But it tells me that he is probably serious. I like to know the personnel because one of the things we should never lose sight of is the fact that the caliber of persons, maybe they will not come from Mars but we need to know who they are right now before we even begin the elections because if we don’t know that, we don’t want surprises.”
We don’t want a president who will say for me I don’t want to be disturbed and so I am going to appoint millions and all of that. For me, I want to see action. I want to see real persons whom we can start asking questions as to what they are adding to the economy not just because there is a euphoria that, somebody will be kicked out and someone else will come. Otherwise, we will come back to the same position we are currently in and it will not help us.”