Member of Parliament’s Finance Committee, Dr Gideon Boako, has linked the recent appreciation of the Ghanaian cedi to what he describes as a worrying case of government expenditure misalignment under the current NDC administration.
Speaking on The Pulse on JoyNews, Dr Boako questioned the source of funds used by the Ghana Gold Board (GoldBod) to purchase large volumes of gold, suggesting that revenue meant for key sectors may have been redirected in a way that artificially supports the cedi.
“There is expenditure misalignment, so far as I see. And when Parliament resumes, we are going to ask a lot of questions,” he said.
According to him, the Finance Minister had initially allocated between $200 million or $400 million to GoldBod in the 2025 budget to support gold purchases. However, the actual amount spent has risen sharply.
“In the 2025 budget, the finance Minister said he was going to allocate something around 200 or 300 something million dollars for the goldbod to buy gold. Today, the amount of gold that this government has bought is close to 3 billion dollars,” he said.
“So the question is if the government budgeted for let’s say 300 or maximum 400 million dollars for the fiscal year for goldbod, and goldbod has spent close to 3 billion dollars, where did that money come from. Did it come from the central bank, did it come from the central government, we need to know,” he added.
Dr Boako warned that such unplanned spending may be draining public resources that should go to essential ministries and services, and instead of being used to buy gold in cedis, convert it into dollars, and inject it into the market to influence the exchange rate.
“They used cedis to buy the gold, sell to get foreign exchange. So it’s not surprising that Ministers in this government have started complaining that the Finance Minister is not releasing funds to them,” he said.
He argued that this could be the reason behind the cedi’s recent gains, but stressed that it raises serious concerns about transparency and fiscal discipline.
“What can simply be construed from this is that government is not spending. The cedi revenue we are generating, which ought to finance critical expenditures, is rather being used to buy gold in the name of GoldBod and then converted into dollars to stabilise the currency,” he added.
Dr Boako insisted that the Finance Minister must account for the difference and explain how GoldBod was able to spend nearly $3 billion within just four months.
“That whole issue of expenditure misalignment is something that ought to be investigated. We need to understand where GoldBod is getting the $3 billion they have used so far to buy gold. All of us need to ask those questions, but clearly, government is not spending,” he said.
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