Minority Fights Gov’t Over Attempt To Touch Heritage Fund

By Justice Dzido On Apr 1, 2020

The Minority in Parliament has resisted moves by the Finance Ministry to amend the Petroleum Revenue Management Act (PRMA) to enable the government withdraw funds form the Ghana Heritage Fund Fund(GHF) to deal with the negative effects of the coronavirus outbreak in Ghana.

John Jinapor, Member of Parliament for Yapei-Kusawgu said the time has not come for the government to withdraw funds from that particular fund because there are other sources of revenue for the e-government to embark on any project.

Mr Jinapor said the Minority will support every move by the government to raise funds to deal with the COVID-19 but not when the government intends to take money from the GHF.

Speaking in an interview on Metro TV’s Good Morning Ghana hosted by Randy Abbey, he said: “We stated on the floor of parliament that we 100% agree with the Minister to come with a document and he has done that. With the proposal to cap the Ghana Stabilisation Fund, the Minority said in the interest of the nation we will go with you and approve it.

“In addition to that he wants to go and borrow GHS 3billion, we said we would approve that. He wants the Bank of Ghana to increase even the threshold of borrowing to up to 10 per cent. All of these we support it. He now says he wants to amend the law so that he can then go into the Heritage Fund but we said no. We won’t be part of that because you can’t take advantage of this COVID-19 issue and deplete all the resources.”

Background

As part of its COVID-19 Economic Mitigation Plans, the finance ministry among other demands is requesting an amendment of the Petroleum Revenue Management Act to allow government to tap into the US$591 million valued Heritage Fund and to review the cap on the Stabilization Fund from US$300 million to US$100 million.

The finance ministry is also looking to draw down some transfers from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank while locally deferring the Bank of Ghana’s interest payments on non-marketable instruments to 2022 and beyond.