ACCRA, July 5 (Xinhua) -- Ghana would not relent in ensuring fiscal discipline in public finance management even after the end of an International Monetary Fund (IMF) support program, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia said here on Thursday.

The three-year Extended Credit Support (ECF) support program with the IMF ends by March next year.

The lender lauded Ghana a week earlier for efforts made to restore macroeconomic stability after the three-year bailout program suffered a jerk in 2016.

However, stakeholders have expressed worry that as had been the case in all previous encounters, Ghana stood to roll back all the gains after the program concluded.

Addressing the maiden U.S.-Ghana Business Forum, Bawumia nonetheless explained that one of the ways the government intended to anchor fiscal discipline was the proposed Fiscal Responsibility Act soon to be passed.

"But let me assure you that we are committed to maintaining fiscal discipline for our own sake," the vice president pledged.

As a result, he said the government was going to implement structural measures to tackle some of the long-term structural issues.

Under the proposed law budget deficit is expected to be capped at 5 percent for a fiscal year from next year along with limits for the debt to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) ratio while an independent Fiscal Responsibility Council is also set up to oversee the implementation of fiscal policy.

This was one of the key strategic elements with the greatest potential to anchor the investments Ghana desired, Bawumia said.

Fiscal slippage jumped to nearly 90 percent in the election year of 2016 after government had entered into an IMF program in 2015 aimed among other things to ensure fiscal discipline. Enditem

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