‘Catastrophic’ benchmark reversal will worsen hardships-Sammy Gyamfi

The National Democratic Congress has condemned government’s decision to reverse the benchmark value discounts on imports introduced in 2019 to cushion importers.

The Finance Minister in the 2022 budget, announced government’s policy to reverse the discounts on benchmark values in order to curb imports and raise badly needed revenue.

The NDC has decried what it says will be the severe hardships that will emanate from the policy reversal since importers will pass on the increase in duty payments to consumers who are already overburdened with taxes.

Addressing a press briefing on the matter Wednesday,Communications Officer of the NDC, Sammy Gyamfi,singled out Vice President Bawumia for criticism describing his stance on the issue of benchmark value reversal as “deceitful”.

Mr Gyamfi dismissed claims that the reversal of the discounts was aimed at curbing imports and shoring up revenues at the port which he says has consistently witnessed increases in the last few years.

He described as “callous and insensitive”,the decision to pass on the full cost of imports to importers when escalating prices of goods and services had become a major problem for Ghanaians.

Mr Gyamfi urged the Akufo-Addo administration to look within and streamline expenditures some of which he classified as wasteful and align them with whatever revenues are raked in.He said the Ghanaian people could no longer bear the hardships imposed on them through incessant taxation and called for an immediate resolution of the situation.