Prez Mahama directs SADA to respond to corruption allegations
President John Dramani Mahama has directed the new board of the Savannah Accelerated Development Agency (SADA) to respond to corruption allegations levelled against the agency in the media.
He also expressed the hope that the new board would work to correct the anomalies that have bedevilled operations of the agency.
The President gave the directive when he addressed the opening session of the fourth Commonwealth Regional Conference for Heads of Anti-Corruption Agencies in Africa in Accra Monday,
The conference, being attended by 17 Commonwealth African countries, is on the theme “Co-ordinating the National Anti-Corruption Agenda within the Commonwealth”.
President Mahama said the urgency that surrounded the establishment of SADA led to some mistakes being made in the rush to execute its mandate.
He said the fight against corruption was one that must be waged with a sense of urgency, adding that the government was fixing the system in a bid to remove tendencies that allowed corruption to thrive.
Declaring that efforts by his administration to root out corruption from Ghana had registered modest gains, President Mahama said a good number of measures had been instituted to stem the rate of corruption in Ghana, adding that “the results are beginning to show albeit slowly”.
But he was quick to add that any fallout from the campaign should not serve as an opportunity for any political entity to score points, saying “it is a joint struggle” that must be fought by all.
Strides made
Enumerating some strides being made, he said the Attorney-General’s Department had started chasing monies that were paid illegally to beneficiaries, adding that a draft bill had been prepared to give legal backing to the Ghana Youth Employment and Entrepreneurial Development Agency (GYEEDA).
President Mahama also cited the abolition of the law that made it possible for government officials to purchase state bungalows allocated to them as an example of efforts being made by the government to fight corruption.
The re-registration and branding of government vehicles, coupled with the reduction in sole-sourcing in state procurements to the barest minimum, he said, were part of measures to arrest corruption in the country.
Ghana, he said, remained committed to the process of rooting out corruption and that conscious efforts were being made to resource anti-corruption agencies to develop the requisite capacity to deal with the canker in all its forms.
Greatest weapon
The President, however, maintained that the greatest weapon and resource that could speed up victory in the fight against corruption was the citizenry, saying that the ordinary Ghanaian encountered corruption every day but their inability to speak against it had led to its institutionlisation.
“This should not be so. We have within us the power to fight corruption wherever we find it by breaking the silence and speaking against it,” he said.
Corruption, President Mahama said, had ceased to be a local problem and assumed an international dimension that required networking and sharing of experience in the quest to successfully root it out.
Be worried
Anti-corruption agencies, he said, must be worried about the destructive effects of corruption on national development and that should guide the conference in coming up with strategies that would contain the canker in order to preserve the abundant resources of African nations for speedy development.
The Deputy Secretary of the Commonwealth Secretariat, Mr Deodat Maharaj, observed that effective institutions and measures against corruption would accelerate investment flows to the region, since a reduction in corruption would provide more resources for development.
Alluding to the inextricable link between corruption and development, Mr Maharaj said when corruption was reduced by two points, investment would multiply four-fold.
Ghana, he said, was a shining example of good corporate governance and democracy on the African continent with the setting up of institutions that were working to stamp out corruption from the system.
Critical examination
The Commissioner of the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), Ms Lauretta Lamptey, said it was proper to critically examine the strategies and approaches being used in the fight against corruption, since corruption was ever-changing and related to several other crimes.
Public procurement, she said, was an avenue for the dissipation of public funds, saying that was a trend that must be arrested in the interest of enhanced socio-economic development.