Sammy Gyamfi Disputes Bawumia’s 2 Million Jobs Claim

The National Communication Officer of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Sammy Gyamfi, has “analysed” data presented by Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia to prove the creation of over two million jobs by the government.

The communicator in a Facebook post on Monday said the data was contradictory.

Per data released by Dr Bawumia on April 26, 2,255,928 jobs were created from 2017 to 2022.

242,461 jobs were created in 2017, 373,708 in 2018, 579,789 in 2019, 357,060 in 2020, 304,885 in 2021 and 226,946 in 2022.

But Sammy Gyamfi holds that the 136,053 jobs captured under the Ministry of Education include jobs that existed before the Akufo-Addo-led government assumed office in 2017.

“At No.17 of Bawumia’s data sheet on jobs created by the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia government (see attached sheets), the Vice President makes the claim that this government has created a total of 136,053 jobs in the Education Ministry under the following sub-agencies; National Teaching Council, Student Loan Trust Fund, Ghana Education Service, Ghana Library Authority.

However, an analysis of figures contained in this government’s own budget statements completely belies Bawumia’s claim: According to Appendix 7 of the 2017 budget statement presented to Parliament by the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta, for and on behalf of the President of the Republic of Ghana, the Ministry of Education made up of all the agencies under it, had a total staff strength of 355,641 as at 2017 when this government took office.

“Also, according to Appendix 7 of the 2023 budget statement presented to Parliament by the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta, for and on behalf of the President of the Republic of Ghana, the Ministry of Education made up of all the agencies under it, had a total staff strength of 387,074 as at this year, 2023.

“When you deduct the 2017 staff strength figure from the 2023 figure, you get 31,433. What this means is that, according to data contained in government’s own budget statements, there has been only 31,433 additional staffs under the Education Ministry and NOT 136,053 as claimed by the Vice President,” he concluded in what he termed as Part two of his analysis.

Last week, he referenced reports from the Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS); and the Ghana Statistical Service to discredit the data from the veep.

“If Bawumia’s claim that this government has created over 2 million jobs is true, it would have meant that unemployment has been virtually eradicated in Ghana,” he said in his post last week.