The Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) has flagged a GH¢712.43 million discrepancy in the 2026 Mid-Year Budget Review’s revenue and grants target.
The Institute said the discrepancy raised questions about the consistency of fiscal data and affected the reported GH¢1.37 billion revenue shortfall for the first half of 2026.
Dr Said Boakye, Executive Director of the IFS, raised the issue at a press conference on the Institute’s analysis of the Mid-Year Budget Review.
The IFS said Appendices 2A and 2B of the Budget Review stated a revenue and grants target of GH¢126.14 billion for the first half of 2026.
It said, however, that the individual components listed in the same appendices totalled GH¢125.43 billion, creating an unexplained difference of GH¢712.43 million.
“This discrepancy has implications for the actual shortfall in total revenue and grants in the first half of 2026,” the IFS said.
The Institute said using GH¢125.43 billion as the target would have resulted in a revenue and grants shortfall of GH¢656.93 million, rather than the GH¢1.37 billion reported by the Ministry of Finance.
It also pointed to the omission of Social Contributions, which it described as a traditional revenue line, from Appendices 2A and 2B.
“We suspect that this missing revenue line is responsible for the discrepancy,” Dr Boakye said.
The IFS identified a separate inconsistency in Appendix 2B over tax refunds for the first half of 2026.
It said the appendix reported two different tax refunds outturn figures of GH¢1.59 billion and GH¢4.27 billion.
The Institute said the Ministry of Finance used the lower GH¢1.59 billion figure to calculate total revenue and grants outturn of GH¢124.78 billion.
Dr Boakye said using the higher GH¢4.27 billion figure would have reduced total revenue and grants outturn to GH¢122.10 billion, GH¢2.68 billion below the Ministry’s reported figure.
The IFS questioned why the higher tax refunds figure was included in the Budget document but excluded from the calculation of total revenue and grants outturn.
“The question is, why did the government state the larger tax refunds figure in the budget without using it for its calculations?” the IFS asked.
It noted that tax refunds outturn stood at GH¢5.07 billion in the first half of 2025, above the GH¢4.27 billion figure reported for the first half of 2026.
The Institute said the inconsistencies required attention because accurate and internally consistent fiscal data were necessary to assess revenue performance and the credibility of fiscal projections.
It urged the Ministry of Finance to strengthen its data validation and verification processes to ensure that figures across the Budget Statement were consistent and could be reconciled.
“Doing so will help improve the reliability of the fiscal data contained in the country’s budget,” Dr Boakye said.
