The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament has asked the Office of the Head of the Civil Service (OHCS) to refund an amount of GH¢175,000 within 30 days into the recovery accounts of the Auditor-General (AG).
This follows the failure of the main campus of the Civil Service Training Centre in Accra under the OHCS to provide the necessary documentation (payment vouchers) to the tune of GH¢175,000 to officials of the Auditor-General’s Office during an audit into the accounts and activities of the institution for 2024.
The Chairperson of the PAC, Abena Osei-Asare, gave the directive when the OHCS appeared before the committee last Tuesday.
The committee is examining the 2024 Auditor-General’s Report, including the infractions of the OHCS as highlighted in the report.
The team from the OHCS included the heads of the Civil Service Training Centre, the Government Secretariat School, the Institute of Technical Supervision, the Management Services Department, the Procurement and Supply Chain Management Department, and the Public Records and Archives Administration Department (PRAAD).
They were led by the Head of the Civil Service, Dr Evans Aggrey-Darkoh, who was assisted by the Chief Director, William Kartey.
Mrs Osei-Asare, who is also the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament (MP) for Atiwa East in the Eastern Region, urged the OHCS to put in place the necessary measures to ensure that the infractions of failure to show documentation did not recur during the next audit.
“Failure to show documentation runs through all the infractions you have been cited for,” she said.
AC’s Stance
The PAC insisted that the OHCS should refund the GH¢175,000, citing protocols established by the previous Public Accounts Committee.
“We will insist on the recovery,” Mr Osei-Asare said, adding that: “We looked at the documents that they provided, and yes, they acquitted payments, but they did not provide those documents at the time they were given extra time to do so”.
She said the committee’s stance was aimed at ensuring that public officials were held accountable for their actions and that public funds were used for their intended purposes.
Embezzlement
A senior official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, Kafui Kofi Kpokpo, who was cited in the Auditor-General’s Report for embezzlement, has refunded €31,624.95 out of the over €40,000 said to have been embezzled.
The embezzled funds were deductions from the salaries of local staff for tax, social security, and health insurance payments.
Mr Kpokpo had deducted the cash from the mission’s Crown Bank account for the same purpose without accounting for the deductions.
The Chief Director of the Foreign Ministry, Ramses Joseph Cleland, revealed that a task force was sent to investigate the matter, and disciplinary action was later taken against Mr Kpokpo, including demotion and suspension.
The officer was also asked to refund the embezzled amount, which he said was left with a balance of €8,086.31 to refund.
Recovery
The Chief Director assured the PAC that measures had been put in place to prevent similar infractions, including training and retraining, with officers posted to missions abroad first needing to undergo rigorous training and retraining at the Foreign Service Institute to emphasise honesty and transparency.
Others, he said, were regular monitoring, conducting regular video checks on accounts, and maintaining constant communication with officers to detect any irregularities, as well as the increase of its budget for internal audits to prevent such infractions.
Prosecution
Some members of the PAC, namely the Deputy Ranking Member and the governing National Democratic Congress MP for Keta, Kwame Dzudzorli Gakpey, called for the prosecution of the Foreign Ministry staff cited in the report for embezzlement.
Source: Graphic.com
