Bawumia has jailed the Ghana cedi and granted the dollar bail – Mahama mocks

President John Dramani Mahama has taunted Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia’s 2017 claim that he as ordered the arrest of the United States dollar and given the keys to the then Inspector-General of Police, David Asante Appeatu.

According to Mahama, there is no time in history that the dollar has been arrested, but that the prudent thing was to help the cedi keep pace with the dollar.

“Under all previous presidents, I never heard anyone claim to have arrested the dollar, jailed it and locked the doors. No one can arrest the dollar, it is the cedi that must be helped to keep pace with the dollar,” he said while addressing some party faithful in Fante.

He mockingly continues: “Now as we are all witnesses, the dollar has bolted, when asked where it is headed, it said it had been granted bail. When we investigated, it turned out that it was the cedi that had been jailed and the dollar had been bailed,” he added.

It will be recalled that in 2017, Vice President Bawumia while giving account of the first 100 days in office of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government, indicated that they have been able to “arrest” the fall of the Ghana Cedi against the Dollar.

Galloping inflation and a depreciating currency are two major issues that underlines current economic downturn. The Ghana cedi recently maintained its spot as the worst performing currency in Africa, according to a Bloomberg report.

The portal said the cedi recorded a -28.82 percent depreciation to the dollar as of August 20, 2022, to sell at over GH¢10 to a dollar.

This means the currency could be heading for a record-worst performance in the last 25 years. The low performance of the cedi has however driven inflation to a record of 31.7 percent in July.