Corruption: MP blames parliament, speaker

The ruling NPP’s lead anti corruption campaigner P.C. Appiah-Ofori is blaming parliament and especially the speaker, Ebenezer Sekyi-Hughes for corruption in the public sector.

According to him, the speaker’s failure to oversee the implementation of recommendations on the Auditor-General’s reports largely accounts for what he described as the continues rot in the public sector.

The MP for Asikuma Odoben Brakwa was contributing to a debate in Parliament to approve the Public Accounts Committee’s report on the Auditor General for the year 2003.

The report points to poor management and administration of government payroll, weak internal controls, poor stores management, inadequate supervision of subordinates and unsatisfactory tax administration among others in the year 2003.

It estimates that the state lost over 3 trillion cedis because of the leakages. Contributing to the debate, Mr. Appiah-Ofori said the malfeasance in the pubic sector occurs each year, saying concrete action from the speaker could have minimized the canker.

According to him, since the First Parliament of the Fourth Republic, reports of the Auditor-General had not been given the attention they deserved. He asked that outstanding debts should be re-valued for offenders to pay the appropriate value.

The NPP MP for Ahafo Ano South, Stephen Balado Manu, said there was much lip service in the fight against corruption. He said Parliament should wake up and live up to its responsibility of acting on the recommendations of the Auditor-General's Report.

He said some time ago certain officials in the Ahafo Ano South District misused 500 million cedis and when he reported the issue to the relevant authorities nothing was done about it.

"I am wondering what would become of the people who are said to have squandered 123 million cedis in the same district."

Mr Balado Manu said Parliament should discard "window dressing, and cosmetic type of fighting corruption".

Meanwhile the Second Deputy Speaker, Alhaji Malik Alhassan Yakubu has directed that the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament should meet with the Leadership of the House to prepare proposals that would help the Legislature to take action on the recommendation of the Auditor-General.