By Iddi Yire Accra, May 26, GNA – President John Dramani Mahama has revealed plans by the Government to reopen domestic and international capital markets. “We’re working to reopen Ghana’s foreign markets in collaboration with the IMF and our development partners, the Ghana Stock Exchange and local banks,” President Mahama stated in his remarks at the 2025 Ghana CEOs’ Summit in Accra. He said future borrowing would be linked to self-financing commercially viable projects, particularly by Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs), Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) and State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs), ensuring value for money and sustainable repayment. Ghana’s international and domestic markets faced significant challenges in recent years under the previous Government, including a loss of access to international financial markets and a reliance on treasury bills for funding.  This situation prompted Ghana to implement policies like debt restructuring and fiscal consolidation to address the challenges.  President Mahama said between 2013 and 2016, his previous administration took bold steps to deepen Ghana’s domestic and external financial markets. He said under Finance Ministers such as Dr Kwabena Duffour and Mr Seth Terkper, and in partnership with the Central Bank and commercial banks, they introduced medium and long-term domestic bonds, listed them on the Ghana Stock Exchange, and operationalized the Central Securities Depository to improve transparency and liquidity. He said they went further to ensure that Ghana became one of the few African countries to issue a $200 million denominated domestic bond, a strategic innovation that supported their smart borrowing initiative; saying “and I am happy to say that bond was oversubscribed. Simultaneously, we accessed external capital markets responsibly.” The President said from 2013 to 2016, Ghana issued four-euro bonds, all without default, and these were anchored in a sinking fund mechanism designed to ensure repayment. He said they applied over 335 million from their oil-funded sinking fund to settle maturing euro bond liabilities and that they refinanced the $200 million HIPEC-era 2007-euro bond through their 2015 World Bank-guaranteed bond. President Mahama said before his previous administration left office on January 7, 2017, they left sufficient reserves, enabling the next administration that came after them to pay off the balance in 2017 of the 2007 bond without distress; declaring that “this was not magic. It was just discipline, and it was foresight.” “Tragically, this architecture was dismantled. Between 2017 and 2022, debt accumulation skyrocketed, and yet the framework to ensure repayment was abandoned. “As a consequence, Ghana defaulted on both the domestic and external debts, a first in our post-independence history.” The President said investors, businesses, and pensioners suffered crushing losses through the domestic debt exchange program, with crude haircuts eroding trust in the financial system. He said Ghana’s credit worthiness was downgraded to junk status, and public sector arrears ballooned, and SMEs were squeezed out of the credit market. He reiterated that this was not simply a matter of global shocks. President Mahama said other countries with smaller resource bases managed their recoveries much better than Ghana; and that in Ghana’s case, poor fiscal management, opaque collateralization of statutory funds, and disregard for procurement and accountability rules were major contributory factors. “The results are visible. A loss of access to capital markets, both domestic and foreign, the collapse of investor confidence, and a shrinking private sector unable to plan, invest, or expand. Let us be honest with ourselves. A true reset must begin by learning from what worked and what was recklessly abandoned,” the President said. “And so, the first thing to look at is how do we lead a reset for the future, a path to recovery and resilience? Despite these challenges, I remain optimistic. Ghana has what it takes to recover, not by repeating the past mistakes, but by learning from it and innovating for the future. Let me outline eight key pillars of the economic resets that we envisage.” He said number one was completing the International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme with discipline; stating that they would continue the discipline in government expenditure and borrowing and work to achieve all targets under the extended credit fund programme with the IMF. He said they were expect to conclude the Fourth Review of the IMF programme in June 2025, with a target to exit at the end of the programme in 2026; and thereafter, they would participate in Article 4 Consultations and adopt the policy support instrument framework, signaling Ghana’s return to responsible, non-borrowing engagement with the fund. Kenneth Odeng Adade