According to him, until the laws are changed public sector workers must go strictly by the book when spending public funds.
He said this in response to a concern raised by the Acting Rector of Wa Polytechnic when he took his turn on the first day of the Public Accounts Committee hearing in Tamale in which the school authority was sighted for some infractions including failure to provide vouchers for some store items purchased according to the 2016 auditor general’s report.
The Acting Rector, Iddrisu Mohammed said some of these expenditures could not have passed through the stores since they were meant for direct consumption.
“I have a problem with the way sometimes we look at laws in this country. Most of the time we look at the letter instead of the script, as to whether anybody will have to take malt and biscuits that are meant for direct consumption. And so that is what you have seen. When we are conducting the exam, we go and buy these things and distribute them to the invigilators to consume immediately but if these law requires so strictly that we have to take time to record these things, then we will do that,” he said.
However, the Auditor General said failure to pass items through the stores as stated in the law makes it problematic accounting for it and called on public sector workers to adhere to the rules.
“When the public sector rules require that you do something, you must just follow suit so my humble appeal is that let’s try at all times to comply with the rules. If we don’t do that, then it becomes very difficult to ensure accountability. As much as I agree with you that in some cases you like to have your way, if you’re somebody who seriously wants to have your way, you must be in the private sector because there you can wake up at dawn and do what you want.”
“But the public sector is not like that. If the rules are not good, make a presentation to Parliament so that they can be amended. But until the rules are changed, let’s not start breaking our own,” he stated.
The Bolga and Tamale technical universities also took their turns on the first day of hearing recorded some infractions including, unrecovered salary advance, bloated budget, transposition of figures misappropriation of funds among others
The Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, James Klutsey Avedzi said the committee will submit a final report to parliament for further actions to be taken against the institutions.
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