Bawumia Hailed For His ‘Gold’ Initiatives Driving Conversations On Ghana’s Gold Sector
A political communication consultant, Dr. Ekow Acquah has attributed Ghana’s recent focus on gold for economic transformation to former Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia.
According to Dr. Acquah, Bawumia’s vision, three years ago, to propose to the Bank of Ghana to start a gold purchase agreement aimed to significantly boost Ghana’s then paltry gold reserves paved the way for the country to have enough reserves and introduced the “Gold for Oil” programme.
In an extensive article, the political communication consultant observed that it is the impact of the “Gold for Oil” programme which has ignited the conversations on gold, resulting in the establishment of the Gold Board by the governing National Democratic Congress.
Read Dr. Ekow Acquah’s full article below:
How Dr. Bawumia changed the conversation about gold in Ghana
By Dr. Ekow Acquah, Political Communications Consultant
Ghana, since its pre-independence days, was globally renowned for its richness in the precious mineral gold. For the country to have been called Gold Coast, because it was named Ghana, showed how rich this country was in gold, and is still is, decades on. However, for decades the conversation around Ghana’s gold, largely focused on mining, and exporting same, a cycle which has been one of the nation’s biggest sources of foreign exchange.
However, with the global economic dynamics hit by unprecedented crisis, nations began to think outside the box, in response to depreciating local currencies and rising cost of living. In Ghana, a 21st century leader, then Vice President of the Republic, in 2022, proposed an innovative policy idea that would change Ghana’s perspective on it precious mineral, gold, forever.
First, he proposed the Bank of Ghana’s Gold Purchasing programme to significantly increase Ghana’s paltry 8-tonne golden reserves – a programme which became useful to Bawumia’s second impactful gold proposal, the Gold for Oil Programme. In the midst of the global economic crisis and falling local currencies in 2022, Ghana’s Cedi was not spared, as demand for foreign to import goods increased.
Bawumia identified the demand for foreign exchange to finance the import of oil products as a major source of Cedi depreciation. To address the persistent Cedi depreciation, demand for more forex for oil imports and its corresponding high increase in cost of fuel and utilities, Dr. Bawumia proposed the Gold for Oil, a programme which ensured that Ghana did not have to look for foreign exchange to pay for its oil imports. Rather, it used its gold, purchased by the Bank of Ghana, to pay for the oil imports.
As envisaged by Dr. Bawumia, this reduced pressure on the Cedi, curbing its rapid decline, as well as stabilised fuel prices considerably. These two remarkable interventions by Dr. Bawumia, did not only addressed the two perennial issues above, but it has also completely changed the conversation on gold in Ghana.
Truth is, before 2022 no policy maker in Ghana had presented a policy initiative on the Bank of Ghana increasing its gold reserves through a gold purchase program, gold for oil, or the use of gold for stabilizing the currency etc. Today the NDC government has introduced the Goldbod building on the basic idea introduced by Dr. Bawumia.
The question is, after over 65 years of independence why did Ghanaians suddenly start focusing on Gold? The answer is simple: it was Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, the former Vice President, who awoke Ghana to the role gold can play in building reserves and stabilizing the exchange rate.
If today, all the talk is about bringing gold to the forefront of managing the economy, it is because of Dr. Bawumia’s defining policy proposals on gold, and he ought be commended. In the the video below from 2022, Dr. Bawumia explains his thinking on how Ghana can use gold to support the economy.
Source: Ghmessenger.com
