On the 25th day of November 2021, I read a letter that was dated on that same day by the National Union of Ghana Students with reference number NUGS/CC/0032. This letter was basically the response of NUGS on the 2022 budget that was delivered by the minister of finance, Mr. Ken Ofori Atta on the 17th day of November 2021.
Information that I have even gathered prior to the said conference states or indicates that, a fraction of the leadership of NUGS met with the Hon. Minister of finance and some conversations went on and that led to the guys holding that press conference and they came to present their views and not that of the students or youth in Ghana.
It will even interest you to know that, the general
secretary of NUGS was not aware of such.
The third paragraph of the letter states that, the National Union of Ghana Students has read the budget already and has isolated portions of the budget that relates to the general students and youth in general and they deem it necessary to make a number of remarks. This is a good step to take however I wanted to find out the number of youth leaders that were present at the series of meetings that was held and where that meeting was held.
I personally did not travel
outside the country within that period hence do not know how come I didn’t hear
of that meeting. One thing that they must note is that, even though they are
the leaders of National Union of Ghana Students, what they must note is that,
they represent our ideas and views and not theirs.
Two or three people cannot go and sit somewhere and draft anything at all and then come out and read to the public that, it is the views of the youth. No way.
In the letter they applauded the government of Ghana, for removing the road tolls which had contributed to lot of inconveniences since it created unnecessary traffic on the roads among several other disincentives to road users. To this I say no. I was expecting NUGS to even present on the plea of the hawkers that were found at the various toll boots.
I think in any case government should have inform them earlier that such a thing will happen for them to prepare. put your feet in their shoes, you have gone to buy perishable goods that must be sold off within two days and governments comes out to tell you that do not sell again. if it were to be you, or your mother, will you be happy.
They continued that according to the government, E-levy is a new tax measures that will be applied to only originator of transactions on electronic payments, which include fintech platforms, a new measure for the government to raise funds to relieve the country’s debt situations. NUGS has applauded the government for introducing this.
To this I, Bro Samuel says no,
since I begin to read about policies in the country, government has always been
increasing taxes with the aim of paying off our debts, yet the debts keep on
escalating because government keep on borrowing. E-levy is the laziest way of
collecting money from people and the youth of Ghana hence must not be accepted.
If you need more tax to pay loans, create more jobs, open more factories,
employ more people, you will get more tax.
In the year 2020, we saw the vice president saying
on one of the national televisions saying that there is no need to tax Momo
transaction, we do not know what happen in 2021 that now there is going to be
tax on Momo transactions.
Mr. National Union of Ghana Students President,
Boakye Yiadom, just look at the difficulties that the citizens of Ghana are
going to face as a result of this, yet you came out as the leadership of the National Union of Ghana
Students to support and approve this budget on your part as the views or voice of
Ghanaian students or youth.
Mr. President, I do not want to believe what people
are saying out there that you took an amount of money for yourself from a
certain source to organize the press conference to come and speak for them.