I don’t have confidence Akufo-Addo is committed to fighting corruption – Sulemana Braimah
Executive Director of the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), Sulemana Briamah says he does not believe President Akufo-Addo is as committed to fighting corruption as he claims to be.
According to him, the President’s inaction in regard to persons who have been exposed for misappropriating Covid-19 funds, in the Auditor General’s report, makes it evident that the president is all talk in his claims on fighting corruption.
Speaking on Newsfile on Saturday, Mr Braimah stressed that the Auditor General’s revelations in the report would have moved presidents in other countries to take prompt actions to ensure that the named culprits are given appropriate sanctions.
“I don’t have confidence that the President of the Republic is committed to fighting corruption. Elsewhere, this would have been so scandalous that we would have expected the president to immediately react to it,” he said.
Also, citizens would expect the President to “give the assurance that we’re going to make sure that any person found culpable would be dealt with. These were monies that came in to save lives and not to let people profit from it.”
Mr Braimah’s statement stems from the Auditor-General’s recent report on Covid-19 expenditure, which revealed that several institutions in government misused the COVID-19 funds allocated to combat the pandemic.
Some of the revelations in the Auditor-General’s report included the disclosure that only GH¢11,750,683,059.11 out of the GH¢21,844,189,185.24 that was mobilised for the fight against the pandemic, was spent on curbing the spread of the virus.
It was also revealed in the report that some GH¢151,500 was used by the Ministry of Information to pay its management and staff in 2020 during the lockdown without approval.
The A-G, therefore, directed the ministry to refund the said money.
But Mr Braimah further stated that he was not surprised by the recorded misappropriation of funds.
This, he said, is because of the lack of proper documentation to indicate the judicious use of the funds.
Myjoyonline.com
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