Fraud, abuse and waste in Ghana’s public services

Fraud, abuse and waste in Ghana’s public services
Masahudu Ankiilu Kunateh, Ghanadot

Marking 50th Anniversary of public services workers in Ghana, Ghanadot’s Financial and Economic Journalist, Masahudu Ankiilu Kunateh takes a look at some of the audit reports of the public sector in Ghana.

Accra, July 1, 2009 - The wanton spate of corruption, abuse, waste and other financial malfeasance in Ghana’s public service institutions is becoming alarming.

Indeed, the Auditor-General of Ghana, each year submits a report on all Ghana public offices, including the courts, the central and local government administrations, of the universities and public institutions of like nature, of any statutory corporation or other body or organization established by public enactment or otherwise set up by public funds.

Sadly, in each year’s report over the last couple of decades the Auditor-General has drawn Ghanaians attention to cases of fraud, abuse and waste in the public services of Ghana.

This article presents a summary of some of these reports, with the clear-cut objective of providing a listing of the types of fraud, abuse and waste perpetrated in the country, how they occur and in what areas they occur.

It is hoped that knowledge of the types of fraud, abuse and waste, how they occur and in what areas will lead public servants to a better admiration of what, in a sense, constitutes the Achilles heel of the system.

Such knowledge and understanding should form the basis of reflection on what has to be done to check the rot which threatens to poison the entire system completely.

Wages and salaries fraud: In Ghana, wages and salaries account for a greater percentage of expenditure in all public organizations, with some organizations spending exponential on administration and less on development.

The reports of the Auditor-General express misgiving that fraudulent wage and salary payment also add up to the total wage bill in the public sector.

According to the reports, fraud, abuse and waste occur in several instances because of low ethics in business and public administration, including the general lack of a system of internal checks, absences of effective pre-audit of pay documents, and lack of coordination between personnel and account sections within the same organization.

Furthermore, there has no lack of ingenuity on the part of some public servants to take advantage of these weaknesses. Some public servants in Ghana are known to have been able to collect monthly salaries on two separate payment vouchers by signing one and thumb printing the other.

Others have been able to collect monthly salaries concurrently at two different stations of the same agency. And still other have collected double pay, but from two different organizations within the public service. Those who have either directly manipulated the system to their personal benefit or indirectly benefited from the weaknesses include all types of public servants.

In his book, entitled “Ethics in Business and Public Administration”, Samuel Woode added that exploitation of these weaknesses has further made it possible for salaries to be paid over long periods of time in respect of staff known to have resigned, retired, dismissed, or on leave of absence without pay.

A serious variation of the phenomenon is the payment of salaries to “ghost accounts” of “ghost workers” and fictitious names. This is the practice of inserting on the payroll, names of “ghosts” that is, non-existent workers, getting opened for them bank accounts in to which salaries are paid and subsequently misappropriated.

Misapplication of loans: To facilitate the efficient and expeditious discharge of their duties, senior public servants enjoy a loan facility which helps them to purchase their own private means of transportation. However, this facility has been subjected to all types of abuses. There have been those who have not used their car loan for the intended purpose for which the loan was given.

Some officials of the public services have purchased vehicles, using government facility, and within a few months sold their cars at a profit, but refused to settle their indebtedness to the government.

Some public servants have taken loans to purchase vehicles originally registered in their names, and while others have taken fresh loans to purchase cars when previous granted loans have not been repaid.

This ungodly act is practiced by the junior public servants too. This is a pointer to the wise saying that “birds of the same feather flock together”.

Some junior and lowly placed public servants have also been guilty of misapplying loans granted them for the purchase of cycles and motor cycles.

Inventory control and property management: After 50th years of Independence, Ghana has no national assets account to know the number of the country’s physical assets, including cars, office computers, printers and furniture.

Poor record keepings, inadequate control over stores, poor store accounting and lack of computers to store valuable information, have been identified as the problems facing storekeeping in the public services in Ghana.

These lapses and loopholes has made it easy for government property to be subjected to abuse and waste.

The Auditor-General’s reports show how items, including refrigerators, gas cookers, water closets and washbasins issued from government stores ostensibly for official residences are diverted to private homes.

It is pathetic to know that, inventories maintained for official residences have not been revised when additional items have been acquired for the residences, making it easy for the occupants to claim public property as their own.

A recent example is the case involving the Former Speaker of Parliament, Mr. Begyina Sekyi Hughes, where he took property worth over 20,000 Ghana Cedis from a house belonging to the state.

Cash control: Theft or embezzlement has been the most frequent type of fraud, abuse and waste in the area of cash control. The Auditor-General’s reports have always been full of cases of paymasters misappropriating or embezzling wages of workers.

There have been several instances of revenue offices or collectors in organizations and local councils not paying in monies collected. Treasurers of local authorities and registrars of courts and traditional councils have often been found guilty of embezzlement of public funds.

Ghanadot