THE NATIONAL Democratic Congress (NDC) has cited the Akufo-Addo led NPP government for deliberate mismanagement of COVID-19 funds to enrich themselves.
According to the NDC, the huge COVID-19 fund received by this NPP administration both internationally and locally was meant for the fight against the Corona Virus Pandemic .
NDC’s assertion including several others followed the recent Auditor-General’s report on Covid-19 expenditure by the government for the period of March 2020 to June 2022.
Addressing a press conference at the Party’s Headquarters in Accra, under the Heading, “Moment of Truth” Series, the party’s National Communications Officer, Lawyer Sammy Gyamfi outlined fifteen most shocking revelations contained in the Auditor-General report.
In view of the revelations, the NDC Communications Officer called for the head of the Health Minister, KwekuAgyemang Manu for enriching himself when he used an amount of $ 120, 192, 379.80 instead of only $38,322,000 to import vaccines from UNICEF/AVAT.
However, about $81.8 million worth of vaccines are yet to be delivered to the country under this minister, to the admiration of President Akufo-Addo who endorses corruption in the country.
The party also questioned the use of GHS10.3 million to purchase Special Life Insurance Cover for 10,000 frontline Health Workers without evidence of Life Insurance Policy document and a list of beneficiaries.
Lawyer Sammy Gyamfi indicated that Ghanaians had raised lots of questions at the height of the pandemic following various risk faced by the frontline Health Workers which resulted in some fatalities.
To this, President Akufo-Addo announced government’s intention to provide life insurance cover for all frontline health workers.
The NDC further noted that the arrangement leading to the 30% life insurance cover from Enterprise Insurance, Company belonging to the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta, was irregular and smacks of underhand dealing, because there was no policy document and no list of beneficiaries as well.
Findings of the A-G report on invoices received from various suppliers for the supply of food to the National Food Buffer Stock Company, the NDC cited the Chief Executive Officer of the National Food Buffer Stock Company for what it calls over-invoicing of waybills, thereby causing a loss of GHS1,406,085.00. NDC is therefore calling for the refund of the funds into the state’s coffers.
Lawyer Gyamfi described President Akufo-Addo’s government as a “monument of waste and corruption”, as he lamented on how a contractor working on a holding, treatment and isolation center at Nalerigu in the North East Region received advanced payments amounting to US$4.5 million, and subsequently abandoned work on the $15 million facility.
The NDC Communications Officer further argued that in absence of a performance bond or insurance guarantee at the time of awarding the contract, has cause huge financial loss to Ghana.
The “Moment of Truth” called on the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament to compel the Auditor-General to charge and to retrieve all COVID-19 funds that have been misused through various infractions and veritable acts of criminality.
Lawyer Sammy Gyemfi cited a Malawian Minister of State and nineteen (19) other officials were dismissed for mismanaging of Covid-19 funds; he called on President Akufo-Addo to do same by dismissing the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta; Health Minister, Kweku Agyemang Menu; CEO of the National Food Buffer Stock Company and other officials who have been cited for what he said are violations of the laws of the country relative to their handling of Covid-19 funds.
Source: Nationaltymes.com
