President John Dramani Mahama
President John Dramani Mahama has been sharply criticised by Transparency International Ghana over his decision to accept two vehicles as gifts recently.
Michael Boadi, Fundraising Manager at Transparency International Ghana (TIG), in an interview on JOY FM’s Super Morning show yesterday, said the move is a contradiction of the ethical standards outlined in the President’s own code of conduct for public appointees.
He said, “I think that the President’s accepting the two cars in the first place undermined his code of conduct, right from the onset, he undermined his own principles and standards that he has set for his own appointees. He who comes to equity must come with clean hands.”
President Mahama, who recently launched the Code of Conduct as a moral benchmark for officeholders, publicly admitted to receiving the two cars, which he subsequently handed over to the state.
Mr. Boadi also questioned how the President could enforce the Code of Conduct when he received high value gifts of GH¢20,000.
According to him, the Presidency already possesses a substantial fleet of vehicles and do not require additional cars, but rather asked the President to redirect the gift as a prudent measure.
“The presidency has enough pool of cars; they don’t need extra cars. He could have said, ‘Thank you, but please donate this to an institution, there are lessons that exist that our leaders should have drawn from. Appointees are prohibited from accepting gifts exceeding GH¢20,000, yet the President appears to be held to a different standard,” he stated.
Mr. Boadi further noted that the President should have learned from a similar car gift case, in reference to a 2016 Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) ruling that found the presidency in breach of conflict-of-interest guidelines.
He added that the section on gift-giving in the Code of Conduct lacks the clarity and not specific on the issue, to serve as a reliable ethical guide.
“The issue of clarity and specificity is important in the context of looking at the gift-giving,” he stated, adding, “If you take the provision or the section on gift-giving and you test it by the principles of clarity and specificity, you will see that the code has some inherent weaknesses.”
Mr. Boadi also mentioned that although the code discourages accepting gifts at public events, it allows for acceptance with disclosure, which in his view defeats the initial intent.
“It talks about the fact that in public events, it is not acceptable, it is not a good practice, and you will offend the system. And then it says you should collect it and declare, that’s contradictory.”
“You realise that the code is very heavy on the accountability and transparency component but very weak on the issue of specificity and clarity,” he said. “Because it leans more on double standard-ness, like, ‘you shouldn’t, but if you may’, but we know that we all will,” he noted.
Transparency International Ghana, therefore, called for a revision of the code to address the loopholes, to align it more with best practices.
By Ebenezer K. Amponsah