President John Dramani Mahama's ambitious "24-Hour Economy" policy, recently launched with much fanfare, bears striking conceptual similarities to past national development blueprints, including the "Ghana Beyond Aid" agenda and the 2017 coordinated programme of social and economic policy.
This observation was critically articulated by Professor Bokpin, an economist, during an incisive discussion on JoyFM's Newsfile on Saturday, July 5.
Professor Bokpin, who meticulously analysed the "24-Hour Economy" document in conjunction with previous national strategies and even Ghana's numerous IMF-supported programmes, pointed out a significant lack of policy continuity in Ghana's homegrown initiatives, contrasting it with the sustained implementation often seen in IMF programmes across different administrations. "From conceptualisation to diagnosis, there isn't much difference in this document and 'Ghana Beyond Aid' and then the coordinated programme of social and economic development; all of that, there isn't much difference," Professor Bokpin asserted.
He clarified that this observation was not to downplay the work put into the current document but rather to highlight the consistent identification of the same core issues across various administrations.
