The President Nana Akufo Addo has assured Ghanaians that Government is determined to bring relief and return the economy back to the high rates of growth that characterized the management of the economy in the three (3) years preceding the COVID outbreak in 2020.

According to President Akufo-Addo, “in recent times, we have been witnessing significant difficulties in the management of the national economy, largely as a result of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the global economy, which has been exacerbated by the effects of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.”

He stated, however, that “the basic commitment to resolving these challenges, within the framework of due process and democratic institutions, must remain unshaken. And, I am confident that, God-willing, we will overcome these challenges.”

The President made this known on Monday, when he delivered the keynote address at this year’s Bar Conference of the Ghana Bar Association.

Recounting the resolution, decisive action and correct policy that saw to Government winning the war against COVID-19, he was confident that “we will overcome our current economic challenges with the same mixture of determination, energy and appropriate policy.”

President Akufo-Addo recounted how his administration came into office at the time of an ongoing IMF supported economic programme, and was able not only to steer the country successfully out of the programme, but also to build, in the three years of his first mandate, one of the fastest growing economies in the world then, prior to the outbreak of COVID-19, at an annual average GDP growth rate of seven percent (7%) in 2017, 2018 and 2019.

“We will do so again. In fact, in the last quarter of 2021, the recovery from COVID-19 appeared to be on course, when our economy grew at seven percent (7%), only for the Russian invasion of Ukraine in the first quarter of this year to exacerbate our challenges. We will overcome them,” he added.