Head of the Economics Department at the University of Ghana, Professor William Baah Boateng, has commented on reports that the Central Bank will soon receive around $700 million to address the cedi depreciation.
The cousin of President Nana Addo, Gabby Otchere-Darko, was cited in a piece by The Chronicle newspaper dated October 24, 2022, as having stated in a tweet last Friday that “$790 million is expected to hit the Bank of Ghana account and that should help improve the current turmoil in the forex market.”
He implied that this money will support Ghana’s currency.
But to Professor William Baah Boateng, Gabby Otchere-Darko need not to have made such public announcement because he will create a problem for the Governor of the Bank of Ghana in the event that the money doesn’t arrive.
He emphasized; “Money does not like noise. When it happens this way, you put pressure on the Governor because if the money doesn’t hit the Governor’s account today or tomorrow and the cedi depreciates, everybody will blame the Governor.”
“Yes [central bank] they can also have their weaknesses here and there but if I have to apportion blame, I don’t think that they will have 10 percent . . . the key issue actually comes from the fiscal side because if fiscal money is not backed by production, there is no way that it won’t have an effect on your economy.”
“You don’t need to annouce it…It doesn’t help. I will repeat, money does not like noise!”, he further stressed.