“I was having sleepless nights when the dollar was going up against the cedi”- Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia
Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, vice president, has acknowledged that he struggled to sleep during the time when Ghana was going through a period of persistent exchange rate hikes that raised the price of petrol.
The vice president claimed that the situation kept him up at night, along with his efforts to come up with a workable solution.
“One moment which gave me a lot of sleepless nights personally was when at one point, the forward exchange rate of GH¢19 to the dollar was used to price fuel at the pump,” Dr Bawumia stated during the commissioning of the new head office of the Bulk Oil Storage Transportation Company in Accra on Wednesday, March 15, 2023.
“We were faced with how much higher it could go. We were faced with a very critical situation because we didn’t have enough foreign exchange reserves to meet this persistent demand.
“Today, you are seeing that in Kenya, they are facing significant shortage of foreign exchange reserves resulting in petroleum queues.
“So, we had to think outside the box to prevent Ghana from going through that situation… and this is where the thinking for gold-for-oil came in,” the vice president added.
The government’s Gold-for-Oil strategy was developed as a result of efforts to find a solution, the head of the Economic Management Committee of the government pointed out.
Dr. Bawumia unveiled a brand-new government initiative known as “gold for oil” last year. According to the government’s explanation of the policy, the government is permitted to pay for imported oil goods using gold in a direct barter with gold that the Central Bank has already acquired.
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