Dismiss NANDO boss

NATIONAL DISASTER MANAGEMENT ORGANIZATION (NADMO) IS TOO DISASTROUS TO BE MANAGED: PORTUPHY IS CRASH-LANDING THE ORGANIZATION AND MUST BE REMOVED – NOW

The National Disaster Management Organization (NADMO) which was created by the Rawlings administration to manage disaster situations in the country is gradually being run aground by its Coordinator, Kofi Portuphy, who, allegedly manages it as a state institution that must be ‘pen/paper’ robbed empty.

Staff of the entity at the national headquarters have quietly been lamenting that if the current head is not removed to pave way for a thorough restructuring, NADMO would become an ‘irretrievably’ damaged state institution.

According to insiders, what is happening at NADMO could be worse than what has happened in the GYEEDA scandals. They are, therefore, calling for the immediate removal of the Coordinator and the commencement of investigation by the Economic and Organized Crime Office (EOCO), the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) or any other state institution that has the statutory mandate to do so.

In a two-page document prepared by some staff of NADMO, they described the organization as “the headquarters of corruption” and going further to describe their boss as the “Mugabe of NADMO who runs the organization as it pleases him”.

They complained of the free-will manner their boss is employing people who are running into hundreds and who for almost a year now have not been paid because their names have not been captured by the Controller and Accountant General’s Department. It is revealing to have heard from the staff that a lady who daily hawks fresh tilapia fish in Bolga, has her name allegedly in the pay-roll of the Navrongo district office of NADMO.

This uncontrolled act of issuing appointments by their boss, according to them is a potential JUDGMENT DEBT being created for the ordinary tax payer to contend with.

The major scandal the staff revealed in their document titled “NADMO MORE CORRUPT THAN GYEEDA” is the alleged payment of eight years salary the NADMO boss paid himself when he was not in office from 2001-2008. This particular allegation needs to be investigated immediately.

Worst still – is the allegation of a claim by management that it had spent about GHC300,000,000 in the last quarter of year 2012. The staff smells something criminal is allegedly inherent in that claim and must also be investigated.

Beyond the allegations of financial impropriety, the workers touched on Kofi Portuphy’s vulgar and reckless dissipation of the resources of the organization with impunity. They cite his use of relieve items such as rice, sugar, oil and sometimes poly-tanks as means of wooing members of the NDC to champion his chairmanship bid of the Party.

According to them it is shameful to sometimes see very weighty personalities of high public standing come for such items. They contend that if Ministers of State, public officers and Party members can always come to collect such items each time they have funerals and other social gatherings – what moral bravery would they possess to discipline him. In fact, they allege some members of the respected Council of State were not left out of these goodies collection.

There is also the allegation of what staff call “NEW NADMO Web-EOC block” which was constructed without the appropriate procurement procedures followed and the contract sum kept as a state ‘classified information’. They claim that their boss and the accountant of NADMO are alleged to be the contractors which smack a conflict of interest here.

Just about a month ago, my own ‘bad-self’ had information concerning a workshop that was organized by NADMO for their Regional Coordinators. The drivers who drove their bosses to NADMO headquarters in Accra were denied their normal per diem which they claim used to be about GHC80.00 per day.

This time round, they were made to sign payment vouchers prepared on ordinary A4 sheets with the face value of GHC40.00 per day. When one of the drivers protested, the NADMO Accountant, one Ofosu allegedly threatened the driver that he had recorded him and was going to make the recording available to his boss and recommend his dismissal. This is how power can be misused with reckless impunity.

ATAFF HUMILIATION

Mismanagement of the National Disaster Management Organization is not only on monitory malfeasance. Targeting staff the Coordinator suspects are not ready to dabble in his NDC politics of becoming the national chairman has been the order of the day. Departmental transfers are made without recourse to professional alignment.

They allege that the Deputy Coordinator in-charge of administration has been relegated to the background each time the boss travels out of his duty-post and the Deputy Coordinator in-charge of Technical, one Dosoo, made to act.

A Human Resource Manager, one Mrs. Abibatu Walenkake, who holds a Masters degree in Public Administration, has been oddly shuffled to head the Research Unit whilst a Bachelor of Arts degree holder in Sociology, one John Dan-Doe replaces her. One Hardin also heads the Monitoring Department.

The changes in these key areas were made because, according to my sources, Portuphy wants his Ada kinsmen to occupy key positions to enable him do his dirty deals without hindrance.

These acts of vilification are not limited to the headquarters. Some staff of NADMO in all the regions and districts have suffered one transfer or the other on suspicion that they are working against his ambition of getting the chairmanship slot of the NDC. In one such vindictive transfer, an offer was transferred and made to report to his new duty post on a Sunday.

It is this same ambition they allege which has pushed him to be recruiting people in large numbers without caution into NADMO in anticipation of the open polls by universal adult suffrage the Party intends to introduce in the election of constituency, regional and national executives.

According to the concerned staff, what is more insulting to the government by the actions of their boss is the fact that he comes out accusing the government publicly of starving the organization of needed resources – whereas he recklessly dissipates its disbursements provided by the same government he blames.

The staff is, therefore, urging especially the President of the Republic, H.E John Dramani Mahamah to as a matter of urgency dismiss the NADMO boss and instruct an investigative institution to delve into the over-all management of this important state institution.

And I fully support this call because we should not normally wait for the Anas Aremeyao Anases and the Manase Azuures to go underground and investigate them when the scandals are right on the surface which needs no digging.

The National Democratic Congress, having its antecedent as a REVOLUTIONARY off-shoot should not be seen to be condoning these naked robberies of our state coffers. We don’t need characters of the Portuphies to head such sensitive security entities.

I doff my heart to the PATRIOTIC citizens within NADMO who fed me with the information I am making public.

THE PRESIDENCY OUGHT TO SALVAGE THE CRUMBLING NADMO AND IT MUST BE – NOW.