Seth Terkper hits back at Bawumia on prioritising energy crisis

quist

December 3, 2015 9:44 AM

What else do we have to do to show we have prioritized solving the energy crisis.- Terkper

Finance Minister Seth Terkper has been responding to some strong claims made by NPP running mate, Dr. Mahamadu Bawumia in a press briefing in Accra, Tuesday.

One of the issues Seth has been addressing Dr. Bawumia's assertion that government has not prioritized the need to find a solution to the current energy crisis.

In an interview on Joy Fm's Super Morning Show, Seth Terkper asked,

" What else do we have to do to show we have prioritized solving the energy crisis. This is another way that the running mate of the NPP, openly ignoring the facts. What does he call prioritisation. I have taken with the approval of cabinet we have gone to the World Bank to devoted 400 million dollars from our IDF resources to secure partial guarantee for the Sankofa Gas Plant, what else do you call prioritisation."

The finance minister added that he has applied for a similar facility from the Africa Development Bank yet to be approved by parliament.

" What else do you call prioritisation, when we have spent the biggest chunk of our oil revenue to the completion of the Gas Processing Plant and the Pipeline."

" These are critical budgetary funds. We could have use the World Bank's IDF funds that we are using for the Sankofa Gas Plant for something else. We could have used it to build roads, so what is prioritisation if a government used it resources which are need for social intervention and sacrificed them as partial guarantee to solve the energy crisis. What else is prioritisation?" the finance minister asked.

He further emphasized the need for a balance in budgetary spending every year. Which is why government cannot spend only on the energy sector in a year as Dr. Bawumia may be suggesting.

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