BAWUMIA PUSHES MAHAMA INTO ACTION -As Gov’t abrogates ‘chop-chop’ GYEEDA contracts with service providers

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Created on Wednesday, 15 January 2014 00:00

BAWUMIA PUSHES MAHAMA INTO ACTION -As Gov’t abrogates ‘chop-chop’ GYEEDA contracts with service providers

fter demonstrating what many have described as lukewarm attitude towards dealing with the massive financial rot that was uncovered in respect of the administration of the Ghana Youth Employment and Entrepreneurial Agency, the John Mahama-led National Democratic Congress government has been forced by the mounting pressure from many well-meaning Ghanaians to take some action against some organisations implicated in the rot.

The Government, through the Ministry of Youth and Sports, yesterday announced the abrogation of contracts with some service providers implicated in the rot at GYEEDA.

Terminating these bad contracts now will not be seen by many people as impressive, after the NDC government had taken huge sums of money under the guise of youth employment creation to ‘buy’ the 2012 election. What many are yearning to see is the monies being paid back to the state and people being brought to book.

Others think the action is just a PR stunt, in view of the fact that the contracts should have been suspended immediately in the course of the investigations and cancelled after the GYEEDA report had been presented to the President.

The bad contracts that have been cancelled now include Rlg Communication's training module, Asongtaba Cottage Industry & Exchange Programme and the Better Ghana Management Services Limited, a subsidiary of Jospong Group, the parent company of Zoomlion.

The letter terminating the contracts, dated January 9, 2014 and signed by the Chief Director of the Ministry of Youth and Sports, Alhaji Abdulai Yakubu, reads in part, "I am directed to convey to you, Government's decision to discontinue or terminate the contract with immediate effect".

"You are hereby requested to continue to have engagements with the Attorney General's Department and Ministry of Justice on your liabilities to GYEEDA and ensure the refund of same to Government", it added.

The action comes few days after Mahamudu Bawumia, 2012 Presidential Candidate of the New Patriotic Party, described the NDC administration as “specialists in coming up with corrupt schemes to steal money from the people.”

Dr Bawumia, over the weekend, in a keynote address delivered at the NPP-USA congress at Charlotte, North Carolina, launched a blistering attack on the “creation of schemes such as GYEEDA, SADA, SUBAH, WAYOME, WATERVILLE, ISOTOFON, AAL, etc. where the state has been defrauded of billions of Ghana cedis which could otherwise have been used for productive development expenditure.”

Dr Bawumia’s criticism, which according to sources at the Presidency, was likely to re-ignite the tag of “dilly dallying and the lack of political will to fighting corruption against President Mahama,” ostensibly pushed the Mahama government into taking the action.

It is recalled that the Ministerial Committee tasked by government to investigate alleged corruption and irregularities in the activities and operations of GYEEDA finally submitted its report to President Mahama on July 17, 2013.

It has, however, taken eight months and the obvious promptings of Dr Bawumia to force government into “leaking” the letter of abrogation of contracts for the service providers.

New Statesman insights into the GYEEDA report reveal that only five out of the 20 recommendations made by the ministerial committee who investigated the malfeasance at GYEEDA have been implemented by President Mahama and his government.

The committee recommended the cancellation of some contracts it said should never have been awarded in the first place.

The report which was presented to President John Mahama at the Flagstaff House on Tuesday, July 7, 2013 also recommended that the companies refund some money to the state.

The President assured Ghanaians that his Government would “...in the next few days, weeks, implement those recommendations in a very firm manner”. But the government did not immediately abrogate the contracts as recommended by the committee, prompting accusations that it was complicit in the financial malfeasance.

Recommendations yet to be implemented

1. All cases of violation of the laws of Ghana, particularly in the contracting and procurement processes be referred to the Office of the Attorney-General for necessary action;

2. A thorough re-organisation of GYEEDA be undertaken beginning with finalising the initiatives to develop a legal framework to provide a legal backing for GYEEDA. The governance structure should have a governing board, a competent management team, an Internal Audit unit and an Audit Report Implementation Committee as and as well as a Legal Unit as provided in GYEEDA’s new Scheme of Service. The current change and migration process should be expedited;

3. GYEEDA should ensure that its strategic plan informs procurement decisions based upon an approved procurement management plan. Unsolicited proposals should be avoided as much as possible. Procurement of SPs for all modules should be done in accordance with the Public Procurement Act;

4. GYEEDA should explore options of being financially self-sustaining;

5. The current practice where various Management team members double as “Module Coordinators” or “Module Owners” should be immediately halted. All modules should be under the supervision of the newly-created Chief Programmes Manager in charge of the Operations Directorate, who directly reports to the Deputy National Coordinator of GYEEDA. The M & E team and system should be strengthened with professional persons, logistics, as well as upgraded facilities. The Committee did not find adequate capacity in the current M & E team to execute effectively;

6. A detailed assessment of unclaimed beneficiary allowances in the accounts of all Rural Banks engaged should be undertaken as some monies have been returned to “chest” on the instructions of GYEEDA Regional Coordinators and SPs;

7. A substantive CFO/Head of Finance should be immediately appointed for GYEEDA and the current acting CFO reassigned other duties or re-deployed elsewhere in the public service. Additionally, the Finance Directorate should be adequately resourced with an appropriate accounting system as well as suitably qualified persons to enhance the control function;

8. The contract with YESDEC, Asongtaba Cottage Industries and Craftpro should be immediately reviewed and rationalised against each other in view of duplications in these contracts. In undertaking the rationalisation, due regard should be given to the effective dates of the various MoUs signed, prior history of execution effectiveness, etc;

9. Goodwill International Group and its CEO, Mr. Philip Assibit, should refund to the state the sum of two million twenty eight thousand six hundred and five United States dollars (US$2,028,605.00) being payments made to them. The committee was not satisfied that the Group rendered any services, covered by a valid contract, to the state. Another amount of two million Ghana cedis (GHS2,000,000.00) in overpayment for services allegedly rendered should also be investigated;

10. Considering the expiration of the waste and sanitation contract with ZOOMLION, this contract should be subjected to competitive bidding, rationalised against a separate existing contract by the same SP with the metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies to avoid duplication and reduce chances of overcharge;

11. The youth in road maintenance module should be redesigned to tie payments with actual road maintenance work rather than mere number of persons recruited. There should be an oversight responsibility for the Department of Urban or Feeder roads. Ideally, payments should only be made on the recommendation of the Department for Urban/Feeder roads;

12. Modules such as ZEED, Youth in Taxi Driving and Youth in Alive Health Services should be abrogated in accordance with due process, as there is a challenge with relevance and the manner in which the contracts were hurriedly signed raises questions. The abrogation of these contracts may be done through negotiations which may lead to the phasing out of any of these modules;

13. RLG should refund an amount of five million and four hundred thousand Ghana cedis (GHS5,400,000.00) being overpayments made to the Company. The MOYS should also engage ACI, Asongtaba Cottage Industries and Exchange Programme, RLG, Craftpro and any other SPs which have received but are yet to pay back loans, with a view to reaching appropriate agreements on how the loans would be recovered;

14. The cases involving the following staff of GYEEDA should be referred to the Attorney-General Department for necessary action in accordance with due process of the law. Where it is considered appropriate, the Attorney-General may wish to consider relying on some of these persons as prosecution witnesses:

Tapsoba Alhassan for submission of false academic certificates for employment.

Betty Mensah for allegedly demanding and receiving a specified amount of money from an official of the Youth in Film–Making (Ghallywood) module, as a condition for the performance an official function;

Osborn Djeni, Tapsoba Alhassan, Omar Ibrahim, King George Fokuo, Peter Anderson Sarpong Bismark Adu-Ansere and Abdulai Badara for various roles leading to unauthorised and unlawful withdrawal of state funds from a Rural Bank.

Tapsoba Alhassan for submission of false academic certificates for employment.

Betty Mensah for allegedly demanding and receiving a specified amount of money from an official of the Youth in Film–Making (Ghallywood) module, as a condition for the performance an official function;

Osborn Djeni, Tapsoba Alhassan, Omar Ibrahim, King George Fokuo, Peter Anderson Sarpong Bismark Adu-Ansere and Abdulai Badara for various roles leading to unauthorised and unlawful withdrawal of state funds from a Rural Bank.

Source: thestatesmanonline.com