The Chief Executive Officer of the Savanna Accelerated Development Authority (SADA), Charles Abugri, has attributed the financial mismanagement recorded in the early years of SADA to pressure from the media and society.
“This happened because SADA went into big projects largely because of the pressure of the society and journalists to show that there are results, immediate results,” Mr. Abugri has stated.
A report by the Auditor General in 2013 revealed high levels of financial impropriety at the authority.
[contextly_sidebar id=”PO6CRaAgkxRFfTTWo6X3xEpMW9c2pLIv”]This came to light when the new management of SADA appeared before the Public Accounts Committee of Ghana’s Parliament on Monday.
The Public Accounts Committee of Parliament has ordered the authority to surcharge SADA’s former boss, Alhaji Gilbert Seidu Iddi, for wasting over GHc 186, 000 on a trip to Turkey, some four years ago.
New management has learned from mistakes
Speaking to Citi News, Mr. Abugri however said the new management of SADA had learned from the mistakes of their predecessors, and had resolved to build resilient systems and employ services of competent personnel to work for the authority.
He noted that the instances of financial impropriety “were also probably because the institution was extremely young without the appropriate systems, infrastructure and human resource to operate it.”
“You have to build the systems. You have to put the infrastructure in place, we have to put the right people in place,” he stated.
Mr. Abugri further reiterated his view that the previous SADA management was “pushed to do these big things before the institution was strongly built.”
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By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana