COVID expenditure: Akufo-Addo has cleared his appointees even before PAC sits - Apaak

Member of Parliament (MP) for Builsa, Dr. Clement Apaak has raised concerns over Akufo-Addo's statement suggesting that nothing dishonourable was done with COVID-19 funds.

According to Dr. Clement Apaak, the president cleared his appointees during his State of the Nation Address ahead of the PAC sitting to interrogate the COVID-19 expenditure Audit Report.

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, in an address, stated that the government has not mismanaged COVID-19 funds.

According to him, the funds were used for their intended purpose when the pandemic hit.

Akufo-Addo stated that it was the government who requested the auditing of the COVID-19 funds, and assured that there was no mismanagement of the funds.

“Mr. Speaker, it was government that asked for the COVID-19 funds to be audited, and I can assure this House that nothing dishonourable was done with the COVID-19 funds. The responses from the Ministers for Health and Finance, on January 23 and 25, 2023, respectively, have sufficiently laid to rest the queries from the Auditor General’s report, and I believe any objective scrutiny of these statements from the Health and Finance Ministries would justify this conclusion,” he said on the floor of parliament while delivering the State of the Nation Address.

In reaction to this, Clement Apaak added that this is one of the reasons the Attorney General and the Majority leader attacked the Auditor General for publishing the report on COVID-19 expenditure.

In a Twitter post, he said the John Mahama-led administration will probe and prosecute individuals who have misused the COVID-19 funds.

“NADAA the Chief Clearing Agent has cleared his appointees even before the PAC sits on the COVID-19 expenditure Audit Report. Do you now get why Dame, Kyei etc attacked the Auditor General for publishing the report? No worries, JM will probe and punish the chop-chop of COVID-19 funds,” he said on Twitter.

The State of the Nation Address is in accordance with Article 67 of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana, which states that the President shall deliver a message on the SONA to Parliament at the start of each session and before the dissolution of Parliament.

SONA is a constitutional obligation and yearly tradition where the Commander-In-Chief of the Ghana Armed Forces reports on the status of the country unveils the government’s agenda for the coming year and proposes to Parliament certain legislative measures.

Article 67 of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana obliges Members of Parliament (MPs), the Speaker of Parliament and the Judiciary to receive the President’s SONA.

YNA/WA