HIPC Funds down the drain?

CCMA QUERIED

WHEN the President, John Agyekum Kufuor declared his war on corruption under the slogan ?zero tolerance for corruption,? little did he know that his own people will expose the porosity and vanity of that slogan.

And now, the ?corruption scent no agye bebiaa? (throughout the country) with some ?authorities? at the Cape Coast Municipal Assembly not distancing themselves from the ?dance?.

Following the supply of 12 refuse containers at ?138 million and an unspecified number of roofing sheets also at ?132,684,530.00 as HIPC items without following laid down procedure, the Audit Service moved in to ascertain the conduct of the assembly.

Consequently, the service, has sent a query to the Co-ordinating Director on the irregularities.

Part of the query headed PROCUREMENT OF HIPC ITEMS NOT ROUTED THROUGH STORES-?270,684,530.00 stated that ?we observed during our audit of the HIPC accounts that procurements of items valued at ?270,684,530.00 were not routed through the stores, in contravention of Part XII Sections 16 to 31 of Financial Memoranda for Local and Urban Councils.

Details given by the query indicate that while the supply fo the 12 containers was not covered by any PV nor date, that on the roofing sheets was issued on August 6th, 2003 but did not state the number of sheets nor any PV number.

?We have asked the officer in charge to oblige by the regulations by passing the items through stores to enable us conduct a follow-up of issues or disposals,? the query concluded.

Information stumbled upon by this reporter indicate that the supplies were not tendered neither were they discussed at any level of management thereby exposing the whole transaction to ?one man show.?

Meanwhile, what happening to the EU projects in the municipality? The scent is there too.

Watch out for a shocker soon!