Don't entrust public funds into the hands of Assemblies - DCD

Accra, Aug. 17, GNA - Mr Francis Owusu Ansah, Kwahu North District Co-ordinating Director (DCD), on Monday suggested that all government projects that concern handling of funds and souvenirs should be given to private entities to handle.

"My Lord I am saying this because, all the projects that had been handled by various assemblies have not yielded any dividends in the past," he said when Mr Justice Isaac Duose, Chairman of the Presidential Inquiry Commission on Ghana@50 asked him to make a recommendation for subsequent national programmes.

"My Lord, I can mention projects such as Ghana Poverty Reduction programme and the sale of the Ghana@50 souvenirs, which assemblies are finding it difficult to account for now". The DCD said assemblies were sometimes compelled to succumb to political pressure to circumvent the rules governing such projects to satisfy political favourites. "My Lord, assemblies have no business doing business, because they are seen as places of social responsibility and there is also the tendency for politicians to give out such facilities based on patronage," he said.

Mr Owusu-Ansah said when private contractors printed and sold the CAN 2008 T-shirts and other paraphernalia, they were able to do it successfully, but anytime such projects were entrusted to public offices they fumbled because of pressure.

Explaining why his district overspend during the Ghana@50 celebrations, he said people who attended the programmes organised by the district assembly outnumbered the number budgeted for and therefore stretched the GH¢10,000.00 account to GH¢1,420.00. Mr. Thomas Ba-Innimayeh, East Akyem Municipal Co-ordinating Director, said the Municipal Planning Committee decided to distribute T-shirts and other souvenirs free to the people to whip up their enthusiasm to get involved in the celebrations.

"My Lord, I do not think that it is traditionally and customarily polite to go to chiefs to demand money for T-shirts supplied, so we decided to bear the cost of all those souvenirs that we gave out." He said private individuals who had taken their souvenirs on credit to sell were yet to account for them although several letters had been written to remind them of their indebtedness.

Justice Duose did not understand why T-shirts distributed to choirs and other identifiable groups were all placed under "Chiefs" declaring, "Chiefs do not sing in choirs, what are you talking about? I know that chiefs sing asafo songs and why do you say they were for chiefs when in actual fact they were for choirs"? 17 Aug. 09