Oil Cash Payment: Adhoc Committee’s conclusion most unfortunate – Kwabena Donkor

Former Minister of Power, Dr. Kwabena Donkor says the Ad-hoc committee did a poor job on the Censure motion against Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta.

The Finance Minister was left off the hook in providing answers to ground three of the Minority’s vote of censure that was probed by an eight-member ad-hoc committee of Parliament.

The ground, which had to do with the illegal payment of oil revenue into offshore accounts, in flagrant violation of Article 176 of the 1992 Constitution, compelled the committee to invite the Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC) and the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) for questioning on Thursday, November 17, 2022.

Shortly, after PIAC and GNPC appeared before the committee to testify, Parliament wrote to the Finance Minister indicating that, he will not be “required to lead evidence in respect of the said ground”.

But the former Minister in an interview with Starr News argued the decision to protect Ofori-Atta in his response to Oil cash payment was an unfortunate conclusion from the Committee.

“You may not be personally involved but you have responsibility. The Petroleum Revenue Management Act puts the responsibility of managing and administering the Petroleum Holding Funds on the Ministry of Finance. You’re the Minister responsible and therefore if money that ought to have come into the Petroleum Holding Fund goes elsewhere you’re directly responsible.

“Absolutely disappointed,…you have administrative and political responsibility for petroleum funds, the Ministry of Energy has nothing to do with it, and therefore if there is a leakage the excuse cannot be that you were not personally involved. If you were not personally involved then you were negligent or you slept on the job. You see when we were crafting the Petroleum Management Act, we were so conscious of creating a watertight accounting system so that the good people of Ghana will be assured that there are no leakages. So if under your watch assuming without admitting that you were not directly involved, then you were negligent and that is sufficient grounds for you to resign.”

The Minority in Parliament’s Censure motion seeking to remove the embattled Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, failed on Thursday as less than 183 MPs voted to remove the Minister.

A total of 136 National Democratic Congress MPs voted on Thursday calling for the removal of Mr Ofori-Atta but the number did not meet the two-thirds constitutional requirement for the motion to succeed.

New Patriotic Party Members of Parliament who were not in support of the motion from the Minority earlier walked out of the Chamber.

The Majority Leader, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Mensah, who led the walkout stated that the Majority caucus will not support the censure motion describing it as baseless and politically motivated.

Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu speaking on the floor noted that the censure motion by the NDC side was intended to embarrass the Finance Minister.

“You (the Minority) want us to follow you on this misadventure. Mr. Speaker, like Pontius Pilate did, we will wash our hands of this”, he stated.