Member of Parliament for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has disclosed that the current structure of the Ghanaian presidency has become globally infamous.
According to him, the “wasteful and absolutely needless” Special Development Initiatives Secretariat at the Akufo-Addo Presidency continues to justify why it must be scrapped. He indicated that the Auditor-General reported its 2021 Compensation as GHS358 million in its 2021 Audit on General Government on page 200.
“Sadly, the current structure of the Ghanaian Presidency has fast become globally infamous for crass duplication and utter confusion.”
Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa
Mr Ablakwa noted that the frightening GHS358 million is in excess of the GHS977, 562 Parliament approved for the 2020 fiscal year as contained at page 234 (appendix 7) of the 2020 Budget. Owing to this, he insisted that there is a hike of more than 36,500%
The North Tongu legislator asserted that some GHS977, 562 compensation budget for the defunct Special Development Initiative Ministry is also significantly lower than the GHS8.5 million the SDI Secretariat claims to have spent on compensation in its “misleading” press statements.
“Clearly, even per their own faulty assertions, dissolving the SDI Ministry didn’t cut down cost — the taxpayer had to unconscionably cough up more in this period of economic crisis.”
Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa
NaBCo’s expenditure in the Auditor-General’s report
Mr Ablakwa noted that NaBCo’s 2021 expenditure per the Auditor-General is GHS644 million and not the “dubious” SDI claim of GHS348 million. With this, he encouraged officials at the “wasteful” SDI Secretariat to read the entire audit report before proceeding with their illogical concoctions.
“In any case, NaBCo has never been classified under SDI so when did it become the responsibility of the SDI Secretariat to pay NaBCo allowances? Also, if the SDI secretariat is now handling NaBCo allowances (which remain notoriously in arrears for many months) as we are being told, why do we still have a functioning and tax-guzzling NaBCo Secretariat at the Presidency?”
Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa
Mr Ablakwa further questioned what “animal is Other Government Obligations”, which according to Napaga Tia Sulemana, a presidential staffer under the Akufo-Addo administration, consumed a whopping GHS1.5million.
“Why has the SDI Secretariat become such an amorphous octopus being used as a slush fund to finance opaque and shady transactions?”
Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa
Commenting on President Akufo-Addo’s trips, Mr Ablakwa stated that Ghana must be really broke. He explained that since the minority started its “unimpeachable tracking of President Akufo-Addo’s condemnable oligarchic travels some 2 years ago”, it has been the longest period he’s avoided €20,000-an-hour luxury jets.
“I can confirm that on his latest Ghana-Egypt-USA trip, the President flew commercial during his entire itinerary and returned Friday night (11/11/2022) aboard British Airways flight BA81 at 8:57pm.”
Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa
Mr Ablakwa expressed optimism that President Akufo-Addo will continue on what he described as a “responsible path” of saving the Ghanaian taxpayer millions of Cedis, especially when the IMF bailout arrives. He emphasized that he shall keep tracking, for God and country.
