After serving in Ghana’s police force for over three decades, pensioner Emmanuel Amey-Wemegah had a clear retirement plan: invest part of his pension benefits in government bonds, complete the construction of his house, and buy a car.<\/p>\n
All was going according to plan until Jan. 6, 2023, when he received a call from his bank that Ghana was restructuring bonds he held.<\/p>\n
“I started sweating,” said Amey-Wemegah, 63, recalling the uncertainty and fear that gripped him and other bondholders.<\/p>\n
The retired chief inspector is one of thousands of Ghanaian private, corporate and foreign investors whose\u00a0investments in government securities were restructured in 2023\u00a0for Ghana to obtain a three-year, $3 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout to deal with its worst economic crisis in a generation.<\/p>\n
As over 18 million Ghanaians prepare to vote in a presidential election on Dec. 7, Amey-Wemegah’s plight reflects the economic anxiety gripping many in the West African country – the world’s number two cocoa producer. Jobs, education, and infrastructure are also key issues.<\/p>\n
During the current authorities’ tenure, Ghana’s economy buckled under the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine, higher global interest rates and years of excessive borrowing.<\/p>\n
Public debt rose from 63% of GDP in 2019 to 92.7% in 2022, the cedi currency suffered rapid depreciation, while inflation peaked above 54%, hitting consumers and forcing businesses to reduce operations.<\/p>\n
The government’s mountain of domestic debt meant that there was no alternative to an IMF deal without restructuring local holdings, something experts said was unprecedented in Africa.<\/p>\n
A domestic debt restructuring launched in December 2022 required holders to exchange old bonds for new ones with lower yields and longer maturities.<\/p>\n
“Some of us didn’t realize exactly what the consequences were,” Amey-Wemegah told Reuters in his Dabala home in southeastern Ghana, where citations for his meritorious service decorate the walls.<\/p>\n
“They stole our money. I was sad and devastated,” he said, describing how the restructuring squeezed his income.<\/p>\n
He cannot afford to fuel or service his car, and now prioritises spending on his medications.<\/p>\n
Businesses have also struggled. An Accra-based start-up consultancy firm which requested anonymity, said its 2 million Ghanaian cedis ($130,718) has been held up in the restructuring, straining liquidity and forcing it to cut jobs.<\/p>\n
FRUSTRATION WITH RULING PARTY<\/strong><\/p>\n The election is set to be a contest between Vice-President Mahamudu Bawumia, representing the ruling New Patriotic Party, and former President John Dramani Mahama of the main opposition National Democratic Congress.<\/p>\n Mussa Dankwa of Accra-based Global InfoAnalytics said polls show most Ghanaians are struggling with a cost-of-living crisis, making it a key influence on the election.<\/p>\n Voters like Amey-Wemegah and the owner of the consultancy said their challenges with the debt restructuring would inform who they vote for.<\/p>\n “We’ve gone to the IMF 17 times,” said Amey-Wemegah, referring to Ghana’s fund-assisted bailouts since independence in 1957. “None of those past governments introduced haircuts. Why is it that this government decided to introduce it. Why?”<\/p>\n Others, like rice-miller Julius Kwadzo Ameku, are dissatisfied with the authorities’ economic performance more broadly.<\/p>\n Ameku, whose firm operates in southeastern Volta region, said the ruling party’s initiatives to boost agricultural production had failed and he hoped opposition leader Mahama would usher in positive change.<\/p>\n “All we need is proper irrigation and flexible loans or grants. The gold, oil and others won’t take us anywhere,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" After serving in Ghana’s police force for over three decades, pensioner Emmanuel Amey-Wemegah had a clear retirement plan: invest part of his pension benefits in government bonds, complete the construction of his house, and buy a car. All was going according to plan until Jan. 6, 2023, when he received a call from his bank […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8727,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":1,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","source_name":"Reuters","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[32,2362,27],"tags":[158,378],"class_list":["post-14350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-featured","category-west-africa","tag-ghana","tag-nana-akufo-addo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14350"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14350\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}