Fitch downgrading: John Wesley will not be happy with Bawumia

A member of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), communication team, Lawyer Beatrice Annan has said the founder of the Methodist Church, Rev John Wesley will not be happy with the Vice  President, Dr Mahamadu Bawumia.

That she said was because the Methodist boys brigade which the Vice President recently revealed he was a member was built on the principle of discipline as such he must be seen to be practicing same.

That unfortunately, she said is not the case.

Ms Annan was contributing to discussions about the latest downgrade of Ghana’s Long-Term Foreign-Currency (LTFC) Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to ‘CCC’ from ‘B-‘ by Fitch on TV3 NewDay monitored by GhanaPlus.com.

“When I saw the Fitch downgrade yesterday, I just said to myself that John Wesley will not be happy with Dr Bawumia because I believe that one of the tenets of the Methodist Boy Brigade is discipline and if you were ever a member, you have to practice discipline. We are here talking about Fitch downgrade and prior to this discussions we have seen the millions of cedis that have gone to apparatchiks of the government. How does the government honestly belie that they an achieve any substantial with the kind of corruption and economy they are running,” she said.

Fitch downgrades Ghana to ‘CCC’

Fitch, an American credit rating agency and is one of the big three credit rating agencies in the world on Wednesday downgraded Ghana’s Long-Term Foreign-Currency (LTFC) Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to ‘CCC’ from ‘B-‘

The downgrade, the rating agency attributed it to the “deterioration of Ghana’s public finances, which has contributed to a prolonged lack of access to Eurobond markets, in turn leading to a significant decline in external liquidity”.

“The government has requested support from the IMF, which is likely to lead to additional financing from the IMF and other multilateral lenders. However, the government’s high interest costs and structurally low revenue as a percentage of GDP have increased the likelihood that IMF support would necessitate some form of debt treatment, although this is not our main scenario. The high interest burden on local-currency debt also means that the inclusion of a domestic debt treatment cannot be ruled out,” Fitch said.

The rating comes in barely a week, S&P Global Rating, an American credit rating agency downgrade Ghana’s credit worthiness from B-/B to CCC+/C and review it economic outlook to negative.

Source: GhanaPlus.com