News:
September 21, 2025
A member of the Local Government and Rural Development Committee Frank Afriyie has bemoaned the high levels of financial irregularity at the various Assemblies amounting to huge sums of funds.
According to him when Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives (MMDCEs) appear before the Committee at its public hearing of Annual Audited Statements on Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs), it was observed during the hearing that one Assembly has infractions amounting to over two hundred and fifty thousand Ghana cedis.
He opined that the said Assembly told the committee of the challenges of communities in accessing potable; and argued that such amount can provide roughly three mechanized boreholes.
The Afadjato South lawmaker in an interview with Ghanamps.com noted that, “what we are doing is to hold their feet to accountability; we do not spend so much money, but sing from the same hymn book and every year same infractions are being re-peated”.
Again, it means we are not making progress; we cannot be chasing the IMF and the rest, when we have money being dissipated. There are some Assemblies that make as much as over three million Ghana cedis in Internally Generated Funds (IGF) yet when you ask them what they use it for, sometimes they fumble. These are the reasons why sometimes it would appear to the public that we the committee members are a bit harsh.
But the burden is on MPs especially the demands, meanwhile the “real development agents are the Assemblies. sometimes they spend these funds recklessly”, he lamented
So, we couldn’t have been presenting them with a flower bouquet when they came before us; and these are the realities.
Another dimension he stated is that there are other Assemblies that are doing so well. When they came, we looked into their books and we patted them on the back.
Furthermore, he pointed out that the work of the Committee has its foundation in law and this is a referral from the Rt. Hon Speaker and he could not have done something, he is not sure of; the novelty over here is that in the past Ghanaians were used to the workings of the Public Accounts Committee being telecast live and there has never been an occasion where the operations of the Local Government and Rural Development was given same prominence. Rather the Committee went into the books of the various MMDAs; and it should be pointed out that, they (the Committee) are not auditors and are not doing auditing work, but what the Auditor General has done, including some other state institutions is for them to have value for money and the recommendations made to the various Assemblies.
“It’s our duty as a nation; and another leg to the accountability is to ensure that there is an audit; so this is to see if the recommendation made by the Auditor General has been followed by the Assemblies”.
In the past wat we did was to go to this various Assemblies and in their confined places go through their books; and we say no if that is not bringing in the needed results as a nation, then we should let the public follow what the various Assemblies are doing and assemblies that are not performing, citizens would see them and ask questions.
Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com