Gold-for-Oil Programme Caused Losses, Merits Deeper Probe – Bright Simons.

Vice President of IMANI Africa, Bright Simons, has raised serious concerns about Ghana’s much-debated Gold-for-Oil programme, arguing that its design was fundamentally flawed and has resulted in significant financial losses to the state.

Speaking on JoyNews’ Newsfile on Saturday, October 4, 2025, Mr. Simons explained that while the initiative was initially introduced to stabilise the Cedi and ease pressure on Ghana’s foreign reserves, it ended up creating inefficiencies that require further scrutiny—and possibly even legal accountability.

According to him, Ghana’s growing demand for fuel, combined with the country’s inability to refine its own crude oil, has left the nation heavily reliant on imports. Although Ghana has two major refineries, neither is fully operational, forcing the government to spend between $250 million and $400 million every month on refined fuel imports.

This dependence, he noted, placed enormous strain on the local currency. To address the problem, policymakers in 2021 and 2022 devised the Gold-for-Oil scheme, which sought to use domestically mined gold—purchased in Cedis—to directly acquire oil without relying on U.S. dollars.

“The thinking was straightforward: since we mine gold locally and can pay for it in Cedis, we could exchange that gold for oil, thereby avoiding dollar transactions and easing pressure on the Cedi,” Mr. Simons explained.

However, he stressed that the barter system could only have been viable if it delivered a better exchange rate than the conventional approach of selling gold for dollars and then purchasing oil with those dollars. That benchmark, he argued, was never proven.

“The barter arrangement would only make sense if it gave Ghana a more favourable rate than simply converting gold into dollars to buy oil. That economic justification was never established,” he said.

Mr. Simons added that the way the programme was structured and implemented—with little oversight and limited transparency—opened the door to inefficiencies and losses that have cost the country dearly.

“The design and execution of the programme created avenues for losses that could have been prevented. These are real, material losses to the state, and they warrant serious investigation,” he emphasised.