Dr Steve Manteaw
The Public Interest & Accountability Committee (PIAC) has accused the Ministry of Finance of failing to explain how an amount of GH¢403.74 million, being a portion of the 2017 Annual Budget Funding Amount (ABFA) allocation, was spent.
At a press conference yesterday in Accra, Dr Steve Manteaw, Chairman of PIAC, disclosed that the laid-back attitude of the Finance Ministry towards a request by PIAC on how the amount was spent was contrary to the spirit and purpose of Act 815.
“The committee remains dissatisfied with the response of the ministry and insists on further and better particulars as to the whereabouts and/or utilisation of the amount.”
Dr Manteaw said in 2016, PIAC embarked on physical inspection of oil-funded projects when it came to its attention that for five years running, the Minister of Finance had failed to fully comply with Section 48 (2b) of the Petroleum Revenue Management Act, 2011, Act 815 which enjoined the minister to provide update on the stage of implementation of oil-funded projects, as part of its Reconciliation Report to Parliament.
He said the committee was amazed to discover that three out of the six projects inspected in the northern part of the country did not exist.
He said on its return from the field, PIAC wrote to the Minister of Finance in August 2016 to seek explanation for what it uncovered during its project inspection.
The committee is yet to receive an acknowledgement, let alone the explanation it sought.
“On this particular issue regarding the unspent GH¢403.74 million, PIAC wrote to the Minister of Finance on 19th June, 2018 for explanation, but has received no response. Not even a reminder to the Ministry sent about a month ago has elicited a response.
“Even as we speak, our request for the half-year data for 2018 has not been fully responded to. We requested for the data on 17th July, 2018 to enable us put together our half-year report.
“The ministry has so far provided data on ABFA allocations, but has failed to release data on expenditure. As a result PIAC has not been able to meet its statutory reporting timeline of September 15 for the report in question.”
The chairman wondered why the ministry responded with so much haste when the issue of the unspent portion of the 2017 ABFA allocation was reported in the Ghanaian Times.
According to him, the newspaper reported that in response to its publication on the matter, the Ministry of Finance had issued a statement in which it had indicated that the said amount was transferred into the Treasury Single Account in 2017 in accordance with Section 46 of the Public Financial Management Act, 2016 (Act 921).
“Suffice it to say, this does not address PIAC’s enquiry and only raises further issues such as “when was this said transfer into the Treasury Account effected?” and also “how is the specific amount of GH¢403.74 million, being petroleum revenue, accounted for?”
“Assuming without admitting that the transfer was in accordance with law, that did not absolve the Ministry of the responsibility of accounting to the public, the use of this money.
“In the view of the Committee, the ‘sweeping’ of the unspent amount into an account other than the Petroleum Holding Fund and co-mingling it with other funds opens the floodgates for potential derailment of the mechanisms in Act 815 to ensure its judicious use.
“To argue as the ministry has that the transfer is to avoid government cash balances sitting in various accounts while government borrows at expensive rates to finance important expenditures suggests that the money has been spent ostensibly on programmes and activities not budgeted for under the ABFA.”
By Samuel Boadi