It is emerging that the country has been over-emphasizing the importance and relevance of the Economic Management Team in the country’s socio-economic development.
The Economic Management Team (EMT) is often perceived as the driving force behind the country’s economic development and is often hailed or criticized depending on the state of the country’s economy.
For instance, the Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia who is the Chairman of the current administration’s EMT has come under heavy criticism and blamed for the economic mess the country is currently experiencing. Critics of the government believe the mess is a result of the incompetence of the EMT that is headed by the Vice President.
But former Member of Parliament for New Juaben South in the Eastern Region and former Chairman of the Finance Committee, Dr. Mark Assibey Yeboah says the current concept of EMT has questionable relevance, describing it as powerless, ineffective, and lacking any constitutional backing.
Dr. Assibey Yeboah is convinced that the EMT is an over-emphasized “toothless bulldog” that has no authority to implement any concrete economic policies on their own.”
In an interview monitored by The High Street Journal, the former MP said, “The Economic Management Team is like a harvest committee at church. After the harvest, your work is done. It has no authority. It is not in the constitution.”
He further states that since the EMT has no constitutional mandate, any president at all can decide to dissolve it without breaching any law, adding that it has no locus to even submit a memo to parliament for consideration.
“Any President can come and dissolve it. Even Bawumia himself can become president and say he does not want any Economic Management Team in his tenure. It’s nowhere in the Constitution. Is it any church that has a harvest committee?”
Dr. Mark Assibey Yeboah argued that “some people even believe Cabinet Sub-Committees have more authority than the Economic Management Team. You can go and sit down and deliberate and propose policies but there is no authority to push it. There is not even a forum. When we were in parliament, whatever came to parliament must have a cabinet memo. That is why in lieu of that some people go for Executive Approval. There is nothing like an EMT memo. Parliament will not even recognize it. It cannot even be generated.”
Although the EMT is prominent for its role in the country’s economic architecture, it is irrelevant when it comes to real policy decisions and governance and therefore stoking a debate over the reevaluation of the structures managing Ghana’s economy.
