I’m paying for my hotel bills – CHRAJ boss

The Commissioner for the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), Lauretta Vivian Lamptey, claims contrary to reports that the State is paying her hotel bills, she has been footing the bills since August this year, as she awaits the completion of renovation works on her official residence.

A Daily Graphic report Tuesday suggested that the State was paying a monthly rent of US$5,500 for her apartment at the African Union Village. The report also indicated that Lamptey moved from the AU Village into a plush hotel which cost the State a daily rate of $456.25.

Responding to the allegations on Accra-based Citi FM, Tuesday, the CHRAJ boss who has been at post for three years, said the reports are inaccurate.

Lamptey said: “We were looking for a furnished house because we did not have furniture and the lump sum required to furnish a house was not an amount we would have had available and all the unfurnished houses was for a minimum of two years, so in order to save money, we took a much shorter lease of six months and then we realised it would take much longer so we took a one-year lease at GHC 450,000.”

“The hotel rate is what we would have paid on August 31 if the house was still not ready. This article says that the State is covering this amount for the hotel, I am paying my hotel bill. I am paying my bills, it is the condition of my appointment that I must be housed but as at this moment I am paying my own bills,” she explained.

Lamptey also denied the claim that she had embargoed the distribution of some newly purchased vehicles for their regional branches. She explained that CHRAJ was yet to dispatch the vehicles because the government had not given approval for the hiring of drivers to handle them.