Government has allocated an amount of GH1.4 billion to the Contingency Vote in its 2023 budget statement and economic policy.

Per information from Member of Parliament for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, the allocation to the Contingency Vote has increased by over GH400 million from GH993 million in 2022.

According to him, the allocation made at a time when the government has appealed to Ghana to burden share in an economy in crisis is “mind-boggling.”

“Significant and logical questions that arise are: why this astronomical increase in the Contingency Vote when putting priority concerns aside, a separate and legal allocation of GHS80million has this time been made for the Cathedral?

Should that not have led to substantial decreases in the Contingency allocation? What new scheme of create, loot and squander is brewing for which a record breaking GHS1.4billion Contingency is required?” the MP asked in a Facebook post.

Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta informed the ad hoc committee instituted by Speaker Alban Bagbin to probe into a censure motion against him revealed that an amount of GHS339,003,064.86 was taken from the Contingency Vote to facilitate the construction of the National Cathedral project.

For Mr Ablakwa, it is unacceptable how money allocated to the Contingency Vote has skyrocketed since 2021.

Per the 2021 budget statement, an amount of GH186.2 million was allocated to the Contingency Vote.

Mr Ablakwa added that it is unacceptable that the recent allocation to the Contingency Vote significantly exceeds the budget allocation made to Parliament, Judiciary and a number of ministries.

“Let’s put the current GHS1.4billion in proper perspective — the amount is more than twice the entire 2023 allocation to Parliament which is some GHS645.8million; the scandalous Contingency Vote provision is also three times higher than the entire 2023 allocation to the Judiciary (including judicial service) which is GHS437.3million; the outrageous GHS1.4billion is also far higher than allocations to several ministries including National Security, Attorney General, Works and Housing, Communications, Railway Development, Chieftaincy, Employment, Transport, Fisheries, Lands and Natural Resources, Trade and Industry, Tourism, Environment, Energy, Foreign Affairs, Information and Parliamentary Affairs.”

Again, he was against the idea that the “insensitive” GHS1.4 billion Contingency Vote allocation “is higher than 14 out of Government’s 16 Flagship Initiatives.”

The monies allocated for government’s 16 flagship initiatives include; Roads Infrastructure (GH2,639,473,980),  Free Senior High School Programme (GH2,957,502,092), Water and Sanitation Initiative (GH74,484,764), School Feeding Programme (GH969,000,000).

The others are; Planting for Food and Jobs (GH660,562,919), Railways Development (GH164,579,149), Infrastructure for Poverty Eradication Programme (GH526,573,888), Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (GH395,070,000).

The remaining initiatives are Nursing Trainee Allowances (GH265,200,000), Teacher Trainee Allowances (GH241,913,000), One District One Factory Programme (GH200,417,720), Regional Reorganisation and Development (GH38,800,000), National Identification Authority (GH37,600,000), Fish Landing Sites (GH26,304,000),  Zongo Development Fund (GH24,409,600) and Micro Finance and Small Loans Centre (GH14,400,000).

The total cost for the initiatives is GH9,236,291,111.

The allocation made to the Contingency Vote, according to Mr Ablakwa, indicates that the government is not sincere about cutting their expenditure.

“They ought to be dealing with this Contingency Monster and not trivials such as hampers, diaries and workshops,” he suggested.

Government has directed public sector workers, Municipal Metropolitans and District Assemblies (MMDAs) not to give out hampers to their stakeholders this Christmas as part of efforts to cut down its expenditure.

“It beats my imagination that government has GHS1.4billion to spend in just one year as contingency, and yet refuses to use that money to employ the youth in critical sectors such as Education, Health and The Interior even as millions of jobless Ghanaians languish at home, particularly as unemployment has now reached an all-time high according to latest population census figures,” Mr Ablakwa further lamented.

The MP is of the assertion that “government is escalating on a grander scale instead of departing from its gross economic mismanagement and insatiable appetite for reckless expenditure which has created the current economic crisis, debt overhang, and the resultant painful and crude haircuts.”

Mr Ablakwa has therefore pledged that the Minority will resist the approval of the allocation to the Contingency Vote.

“This sleazy, sordid, shady, selfish and scandalous GHS1.4billion Contingency Vote allocation will only worsen ongoing labour agitations for better working conditions and lead to widespread justifiable refusal by the suffering Ghanaian people to burden share with a regime that is unhinged and irredeemable,” he concluded.

Source: The Independent Ghana