Fact check: IMF has not ‘downgraded’ Ghana to low-income country status
- The IMF says it did not downgrade Ghana to low-income status
- The Fund’s resident representative said the report that Ghana was downgraded was fake
- The IMF’s office in the country described the story as misleading
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The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has dismissed as “false” local media reports that it downgraded Ghana’s economic classification to “low-income status.”
Source: Facebook
The IMF, according to news reports and many viral social media posts, downgraded Ghana’s outlook in its April 2021 Fiscal Monitor document.
Dr. Albert Touna-Mama, the Fund’s resident representative to Ghana said the media report is “fake.”
Touna-Mama’s office told Graphic Online that "the story is misleading and untrue."
The IMF explained that the generally accepted classification of countries by income level is done by the World Bank—assigning the world’s economies to four income groups — low, lower-middle, upper-middle, and high-income countries.
The classifications are updated each year on July 1 and are based on GNI per capita in current USD (using the Atlas method exchange rates) of the previous year (i.e. 2019 in this case).
Source: UGC
Still on fact-checking, on Thursday, April 8, 2021, the Daily Guide Newspaper reported that former President John Dramani Mahama is demanding the return of a bauxite concession to his brother, Ibrahim Mahama before he will ‘gel’ with the sitting president, Nana Akufo-Addo.
The government of Ghana confiscated Ibrahim’s bauxite concession in the Ashanti Region a few years ago after his brother, the former president, ceded the multibillion-dollar public asset to him on the verge of living office in 2016.
Reacting to the report, the office of the former president dismissed it as “a figment” of the editor’s imagination.
The office said in a statement denying the report that: "President Mahama has remained the statesman that he is and has remained true to his commitments to multiparty democracy."
“He continues to have respect for the constitutional structures and has at no time made any request, nor suggested any conditions, let alone ask for the return of bauxite concessions by any person or entity as a precondition for cooperation with the President.”
In other news, the Member of Parliament for Yendi, Alhaji Farouk Aliu Mahama, donated 1,000 bags of sugar and assorted items to the Muslim community in his constituency.
The donation is to support the Muslims in the constituency during the month-long fasting period which started on Tuesday, April 13, 2021.
Muslims throughout the globe practice several religious activities during fasting including; acts of charity to the less fortunate, nightly prayers, and the Quran's recitation.
As a result, Farouk Aliu Mahama made the donation to Imams, Mosques, women and youth groups, opinion leaders, and chiefs.
The son of Ghana’s former vice president admonished Muslims throughout the country to pray for “wisdom and grace” for President Nana Akufo-Addo to help him continue to provide better leadership for the country.
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Source: YEN.com.gh
