Member of Parliament for Builsa South, Dr Clement Apaak, has called on President Akufo-Addo to urge the Auditor General to disallow and surcharge infractions in his report.

According to him, the directive by the President to the Director General of the State Interest and Governance Authority (SIGA) to within four weeks investigate the causes of the infractions and malfeasance raised in the 2021 Auditor General’s report and recommend actions to be taken in-line with laws governing such misconduct is “hollow” and “not necessary”.

Contained in a Facebook post, Dr Apaak revealed that the causes of the infractions are already stated in the Auditor General’s report, persons responsible identified and recommendations made. With this, he questioned the purpose of the directive and probe given by the President.

“The President should urge the Auditor General to disallow and surcharge! If it is about retrieving funds, the President should tell the Auditor General to apply his powers to disallow and surcharge without fear or favour.”
Dr Clement Apaak

The President, Dr Apaak stated, like the 32 CSOs and well-meaning Ghanaians, should express “revulsion at the reluctance of the Auditor General to apply the full powers granted his office to retrieve billions of unaccounted and embezzled” public funds.

It will be recalled that President Akufo-Addo on October 3, 2022, directed the Director of SIGA to investigate the causes of the infractions and malfeasance raised in the 2021 Auditor-General’s report.

Amb. Edward Boateng, Director of SIGA is expected to also recommend actions to be taken in line with laws governing such misconduct.

The President also charged the CEOs to change the poor narrative surrounding the management of public institutions stressing that despite investments made in the entities, loss-making continues to define them.

Auditor-General’s report

A total of ¢17.4 billion in financial irregularities were flagged by the Auditor-General in its latest report submitted to Parliament for the 2021 financial year.

This represents a 36% rise compared to that of 2020. At a meeting with Chief Executive Officers of State-Owned Enterprises, President Akufo-Addo described the development as unfortunate and demonstrates poor management and supervision of state assets.

Similar audit reports conducted on institutions in 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020 show irregularities to the tune of GH₵ 12 billion, GH₵3 billion, GH₵ 5.4 billion, GH₵ 12.8 billion respectively.

The GH₵ 4.6 billion increase for the year 2021 is blamed mainly on credit power sales of GH¢6 billion involving Volta River Authority and Northern Electricity Development Company (NEDCO). This comprises the sale of power to mines, ministries, departments and agencies and government’s Covid-19 relief program.

Failure by management to document agreements covering some of these transactions as well as following through to recover the monies have been cited as the reasons for the situation by the report. Also, the report cited the Covid-19 National Trust Fund for failing to account for an amount of GH¢254,203.00 spent on the procurement of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). This was money paid to the Covid-19 Private Sector Fund for the Procurement.