Mar 13, 2013 at 9:29pm

A former CEO of Databank Financial Services Ltd, Ken Ofori Atta has underscored the need for Ghana to invest in leaders with integrity in an effort to build stronger foundations for the state.

According to him, Ghana’s future cannot be transformed if successive governments lack integrity.

Mr. Ofori Atta was speaking at the “Integrity in Governance Lecture” organized by the William Ofori-Atta Institute of Integrity.

Delivering a lecture on the theme; 'Ghana’s Future; Integrity, Rights and Responsibilities of Citizens', he noted that key institutions such as the legislature, Electoral Commission, law enforcement agencies and the Executive, needed to be run by people with integrity.

"How else can we have strong institutions if we do not focus on having men and women with integrity?”

According to him, since the various “institutions are not built by robots,” it was imperative that the people who built them have integrity.

"We must have the courage to rip out an institution run with people with no integrity.”

Ken Ofori Atta also called for a strict enforcement of Ghana’s procurement laws as a means of checking corruption.

“During the celebration of the 56th independence anniversary; our development partners were compelled to voice out their disappointment with the government’s performance last year.

They highlighted corruption, poor public service and the lack of fiscal discipline that led Ghana registering the biggest budget deficit ever.”

“Indeed the solution to tackling corruption and the unhealthy practice of sole sourcing public procurement contracts in recent years is to review the public procurement act,” Mr Ofori Atta noted.



By: Eugenia Tenkorang/citifmonline.com/Ghana