Fiscal Council members nominated

The nation has taken a significant step toward strengthening its public finances institutional architecture, with President John Dramani Mahama nominating five individuals to serve on a newly constituted Fiscal Council; an independent statutory body charged with monitoring government’s adherence to fiscal rules and advising on the management of public funds.

Dr. Emmanuel Oteng Kumah, an international economic consultant with 25 years of experience at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), including a stint as Division Chief and IMF Resident Representative in Djibouti, has been nominated as Chairperson. He is also a former Board Chairman of Standard Chartered Bank Ghana.

The remaining members are Dr. Henry Akpenamawu Kofi Wampah, who served as Bank of Ghana Governor from 2013 to 2016; Associate Professor Patrick Opoku Asuming of the University of Ghana Business School, a development economist with a PhD from Columbia University; and J. Kweku Bedu-Addo, a former public policy expert at the Ministry of Finance.

The fifth member is Leslie Dwight Mensah, a research fellow at the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), who joins the Council as the representative from a research think-tank. Mr. Mensah brings a distinguished profile to the body.

The nominations announced  by the Presidency on Wednesday, April 8 were made pursuant to Section 11D of the Public Financial Management Act, 2016 (Act 921), as amended by the Public Financial Management (Amendment) Act, 2025 (Act 1136). All five nominees are subject to parliamentary approval before the Council becomes operational.

“The Fiscal Council will work to strengthen financial oversight, fiscal prudence and shape sound decision making in public financial management,” the statement signed by Felix Kwakye Ofosu, Minister of Government Communications, announcing the development read in part.

Before his career in economic policy research, Mr Mensah served as Deputy Editor of the Business and Financial Times between 2011 and 2013; a position he held at a notably young age and one he remains the youngest person to have occupied. He is also the youngest member of the newly constituted Council.

At the IFS, he has demonstrated an independent disposition toward fiscal policy. In the IFS review of the 2024 budget, he warned that elevated Treasury bill yields exceeding 30 percent were eroding the gains from Ghana’s domestic debt restructuring, arguing that without stronger fiscal consolidation government risked compounding its financing burden.

More recently, in August 2025, he cautioned against an early return to the international capital market, describing resumed external borrowing as unsustainable and urging  government to instead deepen revenue mobilisation in the extractive sector.

The Council’s establishment comes at a moment of acute fiscal sensitivity. Ghana is navigating the final stages of its IMF-supported programme, with government targetting a debt-to-GDP ratio of no more than 45 percent and primary surplus of at least 1.5 percent.

Officials at the Ministry of Finance have argued that an independent external institution is essential to credibly enforce these targets;  a view echoed by policy analysts who have long pointed to weak expenditure controls and recurrent fiscal slippages as structural vulnerabilities in Ghana’s public finance management.

The 2025 amendment that created the Council also repealed the Fiscal Responsibility Act, 2018 and replaced the Presidential Fiscal Advisory Council that had operated since that year.

Under the new law, Council members are barred from holding any position within government – a provision intended to insulate the body from political influence.

Responding to an enquiry on X (formerly Twitter) about  how the current council differs in reach from the erstwhile Fiscal Responsibility Advisory Council, Dr. Theo Acheampong, Technical Advisor at the Finance Ministry said: “First one was just Advisory; this new one has teeth to bite (sic)! They draw their mandate directly from the PFM Act, as amended. They have a clear mandate, reporting lines and modes of engagement with diverse stakeholders”.

“The global evidence on fiscal councils (sic) is very clear: the empirical evidence shows that having a fiscal council is associated with ‘more accurate and possibly less optimistic fiscal forecasts, as well as greater compliance with fiscal rules’.

“However, the independence of such a council is critical to achieving such compliance. We’ve (sic) legislated the independence of Ghana’s Fiscal Council. The work to be done now is giving it the tools to perform and assert that independence,” he added.

The Council is expected to produce three substantive reports annually, timed to coincide with the mid-year budget review, presentation of the main budget and other fiscal compliance assessments.

It will also conduct value-for-money reviews and evaluate the distributional impact of government expenditure on poverty and inequality.

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