The Minister of Youth and Sports, Mahama Ayariga, has stated that it is not necessary for the president to dismiss his predecessor Elvis Afriyie Ankrah over his role in Ghana’s poor showing at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.
Revelations at the Dzamefe Commission which is investigating Ghana’s participation at the 2014 World Cup tournament seem to have implicated the former Sports Minister.
Ghanaians have called for the outright dismissal of Elvis Afriyie Ankrah and his Deputy, Joseph Yamin for the abysmal performance of the Black Stars at the World Cup and the scandals that arose during their stay in Brazil.
But the President’s decision to re-assign both Ministers angered Ghanaians who were of the view that there is overwhelming evidence of mismanagement of state funds during the World Cup.
[contextly_sidebar id=”IVpJltFFR65HUWM6qnXJIawBL8GE5yFy”]President John Mahama has subsequently been criticized for re-assigning ‘corrupt’ officials in his government to the Presidency instead of kicking them out of his administration.
Speaking on the Citi Breakfast Show on Tuesday, Ayariga said it is not possible that his predecessor will in any way influence the work of the Commission.
“…so their continuous stay in office while the commission is doing its work does not in any way endanger the commission being able to come to the appropriate conclusions,” he said.
According to him, the Justice Dzamefe Commission is a constitutional body headed by a Court of Appeal Judge which is constitutionally independent therefore, “the likelihood that anybody from the President to the Speaker of Parliament will be able to interfere with the work of the commission doesn’t exist.”
He advised that it will be appropriate for the general public “to wait till after the commission has actually completed its work and presented its work and give you a basis for taking decisions about people who appeared before the commission.”
Adu Asare’s dimissal
The Sports Minister also clarified that the presidential staffer, Adu Asare, was not sacked from his post as the Chief Executive Officer of the Youth Enterprise Support (YES) Fund.
He noted that “there is a lot of effort on the part of the public to define what has happened as sacking but it’s not sacking.”
Adu Asare was on Monday asked to revert to his post as presidential staffer but sections of the general public attributed this development to his involvement in the poor preparation and organization of Ghana’s participation at the World Cup.
He was the head of the Protocol and Supporters Welfare Union for the Brazil 2014 World Cup and during his appearance before the Dzamefe Commission; he admitted that some funds collected for Ghana’s World Cup campaign was misappropriated.
This led to calls for his dismissal from the YES fund.
But according to Ayariga, people should desist from describing the situation as a dismissal because he is still a presidential staffer.
“He is a presidential staffer which I believe is actually a higher level responsibility because to work directly for the President is a higher level responsibility and managing a project such as YES in my opinion is a lower; it’s a bit further from the President.”
He explained that presidential staffers attend to the “immediate things the President needs to be done…So it’s not a light position, it’s a big job. Removing them [Adu Asare and Afriyie Ankrah] will interfere with the work of the commission.”
By: Efua Idan Osam/citifmonline.com/Ghana
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