The technical university is said to have entered into a joint venture agreement with private firm, SONTECT for the procurement of some facilities to help students in the school have practical training in computer repairing and assembling.

Under the agreement, a new firm was formed with the name Kumasi Polytechnic SONTECT  (KPST) in which the polytechnic was to have a 40% share, and SONTECT, 60%.

But there are claims that whereas evidence abound that the Kumasi Technical University committed a huge chunk of resources, less can be said of SONTECT.

This was revealed when the authorities of the Technical University appeared before the Public Accounts Committee sitting in Sunyani.

PAC on Monday, February 19, 2018, began public hearings of the report of the Auditor-General of financial expenses of Municipal/District Assemblies (MDAs), Tertiary and pre-tertiary institutions in the Brong Ahafo and Ashanti Regions.

Chairman of the Committee and Member of Parliament for the Ketu North Constituency, James Klutse Avedzi, after three hours of debating the contract signed between the University and SONTECT (KPST), ruled that the discussion be suspended to make way for all those involved in the process to be invited in Accra to provide further and better particulars to address the queries.

He stated that due process was not followed and there were a lot of issues that needed to be answered and “that is why we spent more than two hours on that particular issue and that is where we realized that there were accusations and counter accusations.”

“We need to bring all the parties together to go deep into the matter and bring it to its logical conclusion. We need to put all the people together to bring finality to the matter and that is why we suspended discussion on this matter that at another time, we will be inviting the university with appropriate bodies to come to Accra to respond to the issues,” he added.

Speaking to Citi News after appearing before the Committee, acting Vice Chancellor of the Kumasi Technical University, Prof. Asiamah Yeboah, admitted that he took over the administration of the university in January 2017, and the KPST issue dated back to 2011 when he was not in office, and that he was still studying the documents.

Prof. Yeboah explained that the University [then Kumasi polytechnic], entered into the contract with SONTECH to give birth to a new company called KPST, and per the arrangements, Kumasi Polytechnic was supposed to have 40% and SONTECH 60% of assembling of computers and other software services to boost the knowledge and capacity of Engineering and Computer Science students of the university.

The initiative, Prof. Yeboah said was a good move but faced implementation challenges that made nonsense of the whole initiative.

On the way forward, he said the previous council advised the board to abrogate the contract and even appointed auditors to lead the process to audit the contract records, and the claim that SONTECT which owned 60% of the birthed company committed some resources to the project.

The Acting Rector disputed that claim, and said “there’s no evidence to prove that SONTECT has paid anything as support or commitment to the project.”

The acting Vice Chancellor said all the issues concerning the institution have been reported to the University Council awaiting their advice and directions on the projects.

Sunyani Technical University appears before PAC

Still at the committee sitting, the Sunyani Technical University on the other hand discharged itself creditably to the admiration of the committee.

The committee was however not happy with delays with the completion of GETFUND projects at the institution.

But in response, the Vice Chancellor of the University, Prof. Kojo Adinkra Appiah, blamed the delays on delayed cash flow from the GETFUND making it difficult for the contractors to continue the work.

“In fact, money was not coming from the GETFUND, and that gave a lot challenges to the project and so when the external auditors came, they thought they were infractions, but we took our time and explained to them. They realize they were genuine challenges and that was why the projects were not completed on time”, he explained.

He appealed to government and the GETFUND to intervene and provide the necessary assistance to complete the projects which he said is helping to address the classroom, offices and accommodation challenges of the institution.

The Vice Chairman of Committee, Edward Dery, expressed worry over the side-stepping of procedures stipulated by the Financial Management Act management and heads of institutions and MDAs.

He accused management of the Kumasi Technical University of deliberately dodging all the queries raised by the committee and pledged members’ readiness to do the necessary due diligence to ensure the right thing was done and misappropriated funds refunded.

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By: Mashoud Kombat/citifmonline.com/Ghana

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The Committee’s hearings, which will take place from Monday, February 19 to Saturday, February 24, 2018, will consider financial infractions of the MMDAS, Technical Universities and Pre-University Institutions for 2015/2016 financial year for both the Brong Ahafo and Ashanti Regions.

Chairman of the Committee, James Klutse Avedzi, in his address, said giving false testimony and information to the Committee amounts to perjury and a liability to the strict application of the laws of the country and therefore cautioned the invited institutions and individuals to be careful and not fall foul of the law.

He stated that the Committee was not a fault-finding one, and is established under Article 103 of the Constitution with the powers of a High Court and therefore tasked managers of the country’s resources to ensure value for money in their expenses on behalf of Ghanaians.

He told Citi News there were some outstanding issues which the Committee would recommend to Parliament for government to take action to enhance good financial governance and management of public finances to ensure value for money.

“We are governed by the rule of law. So if you go against the law, we will recommend for the law to take its own course,” he emphasized.

The PAC Chairman stated that the collaboration between the Committee and the Auditor-General’s Department over the years has helped in the fight against corruption in the country.

“Yes, there has been improvement and there will be more improvement when officers are surcharged and made to pay back the money they have embezzled. In the past, the process used to be cumbersome but now the Auditor-General has power under article 187 to disallow these expenditures and you are made to pay those expenditures”, he explained.

He identified financial constraints and inadequate time to study and securitize the reports as the main challenges facing the committee and its work and commended Parliament and a German-based NGO, GIZ, for sponsoring the work of the Committee.

“Our challenge as a Committee is funding and time but nevertheless we are prepared to work for Mother Ghana and so we are doing the work. Our second challenge is time because the kind of work we do as a Committee involves a lot of hardwork and sometimes we don’t have adequate time to peruse the reports very well because we are going to use one week to look at all the MMDAs, Technical Universities and Pre-University Institutions in the Brong Ahafo and Ashanti Regions using two days to do that. So we are stressing to do the work”, he lamented.

The Deputy Ranking Member of the PAC and MP for Nantong, Mohammed Hardi Tuferu appealed to Ghanaians and stakeholders to help fight corruption and malfeasance in the country for sustainable growth and development.

He tasked heads of institutions to strive to abide by the oath they swore before the Committee and be guided by its consequences.

Kumasi and Sunyani Technical Universities are expected to face the committee to answer queries on some infractions detected in their accounts books, followed by Municipals and Districts Assemblies and Pre-University Institutions in the two regions.

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By: Mashoud Kombat/citifmonline.com

The post We won’t condone false testimonies – PAC warns institutions appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

The sitting will take place for the next two weeks.

Over the period, government institutions such as the Health Ministry and Ghana National Petroleum Commission (GNPC) are expected to appear before the Committee to answer queries captured in the 2015 Auditor General’s Report as well as Performance Audit Reports conducted by the Auditor General.

Ahead of the sitting, Vice Chairman of the Committee, Edward Dery explained specific issues that will be on the table for discussion.

“A lot of Ministries are expected to appear before the Committee. Ministry of Health, Ministry of Agric, Ministry of Trade and Industry so basically we are going to capture a very wide range of the scope with emphasis on the job done by Auditor General…We will look at the Bank of Ghana but most of the work is going to be on 2015 Auditor General report.”

The first public hearing was held in April in Parliament, where the committee considered financial infractions of the Bank of Ghana, Food and Drugs Authority and other agencies.

Four reports of the Auditor General was considered during the Committee’s last sitting.

The reports included the Bank of Ghana’s foreign exchange transaction and receipts and payments for the first half year and second half year of 2015, performance reports on disposal of government vehicles by the Ministry of Food and Agriculture and the Ministry of Health and performance report on drug use in Ghana by the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA).

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By: Duke Mensah Opoku/citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post PAC begins 2nd public sittings today appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

Earlier, the Director General of the Service, Dr Anthony Nsiah Asare raised concerns over some of the conclusions in the 2015 Auditor General’s report in a strongly worded letter.

[contextly_sidebar id=”tYHwUCG5NSA7Rd9guo3g1teOFdIY5Pht”]But after the committee probed further, he succumbed and agreed that it was wrong for the vehicles to have been sold to staff members, some for as low as 350 cedis without contacting the Auditor General.

“If you look at the paragraphs, what we were trying to do is to tell that the information was available which was not captured, but if the tone is harsh , I take it back and say we should have written it in another way or sentence so I am a bit sorry about that. I should have called the Auditor General to discuss this amicably.”

Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Committee, James Klutse Avedzi, hailed the payment of 61,000 cedis from the Health Service.

“…We have been saying that many Ghanaians do not know that this is one of the success stories. We want to bring this to the attention of Ghanaians. The cars were auctioned as far back 2014, and the monies were paid by these auctioneers to the Ghana Health Service and they were keeping the money in their account and they were using the money so when we invited them to appear before the committee, they quickly mobilized the money and went and pay the money.”

Auctioning issues at MoFA

The Public Accounts Committee previously grilled officials of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) after an auctioneer to the ministry was said to have contravened auction laws by auctioning 24 vehicles to staff of the ministry at ridiculously low prices.

The auctioneer, Alex Adjei, side-stepped all the laws governing the proper disposal of government vehicles and disposed off the vehicles, mostly double-cabin pickups, to the staff of the ministry and pocketed GHc33,203 as his 7% commission on the sale of the vehicles.

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By: Marian Ansah/citifmonline.com/Ghana
Follow @EfeAnsah

The post PAC slams Health Ministry for selling state cars cheaply to staff appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

Speaking in an interview with Citi News’ Richard Dela Sky, the PAC chairman said the law will help forestall such last minute governance processes.

“The way things are going I believe we shouldn’t leave these kind of things to discretion, so there is a need for us to enact legislation that will stop this kind of rot,” he added.

[contextly_sidebar id=”uzkLU8touqzBfwQyQ9K40ORIpKL28JUH”]Mr. Agyeman-Manu’s comment follows an uproar by the incoming New Patriotic Party government over the awarding of new contracts and recruitments by the outgoing National Democratic Congress (NDC) government after its defeat in the December 7 polls.

But the NDC administration has justified its action saying it is not against Ghana’s laws.

Mr. Agyeman-Manu noted that “in Australia they have laws; six months to the end of your term, you don’t sign certain contracts, you can’t commit the state to certain sums of money.”

He said because Ghana’s does not have such laws, any government needs what exercise “prudence” during its last days in office.

“What they [NDC] are doing, to me it is very bad and it doesn’t tally in good governance. Ten days or one month to exit where you are and you are committing the national resources to the level that we are hearing that they are committing makes the situation really awful.  There may not be any rules, regulations that will stop an outgoing government from signing any contract but it behooves on you to be prudent in the decisions and actions you take. You have one week to move away and you are committing the nation to millions of dollars.”

“The question is; are you living resources there to pay for the commitment or you are just committing expenditure for someone to come and raise money to pay? That is why I’m saying that if you don’t leave and take prudent decisions you may not be acting in the interest of the state but in your own interest,” he added.

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By: Godwin A. Allotey/citifmonline.com/Ghana
Follow @AlloteyGodwin

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