Governor of the Bank of Ghana blows $504, 000 on gold watches

The Governor of the Bank of Ghana, Dr Abdul-Nashiru Issahaku, is spending €450,000 ($504,000 or nearly Two Million Ghana Cedis) on gold watches.

Documents seen by the Daily Statesman confirm that on July 22, 2016, the central bank sent a request to the Public Procurement Authority to sole source the procurement of ladies and gents gold watches from Messrs A Swiss Watch Company.

The request letter indicated that "BoG intends to use part of its 2016 budgetary allocation to fund the procurement of 24 units of 18 carat ladies gold watches and 48 units of gents gold watches," all Tissot Gold Watches from the local dealer.

The reason for spending over half a million dollars on 72 pieces of watches, according to the BoG, is "as an award to deserving members of staff who had served with the Bank for thirty years or more and are due to retire compulsorily from the service of the Bank in the years 2016 and 2017."

Our information is that the Public Procurement Authority quickly approved the request for this purchase to be single sourced.

Under the Mahama government sole sourcing, which was meant to be under exceptional circumstances, has rather become the norm, with billions of dollars estimated to have been wasted through this.

The deficit in value for money in public procurements has been one of the biggest minuses under the NDC and accounts for inflated cost of contracts.