'Chop chop' at AMA

An audit of the activities of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) between January 1 and December 31, 2011 has uncovered massive rot.

The audit report, which was commissioned under the signatory of the District Auditor of the Assembly, Gladys Anaglate, indicated that for the year under review, monies totaling GH¢1,303,074.88 were released to certain individuals for the construction of school structures to end the school shift system in the metropolis without passing through the tender process in contravention of the Public Procurement Act (PPA), Act 663.

Another amount of GH¢1,537,909.21, which represents payments made on 215 pay vouchers, was not captured in the electronic cash book, thereby understating the expenditure quoted in the 2011 financial statements.

Management of the Assembly did not only vary contracts without authority but also overpaid contractors by GH¢53,657.33 without recourse to the AMA’s tender committee.

The Assembly was therefore ordered to recover the amount involved from the beneficiary contractors.

Apart from that, a copy of the audit report, which is in the possession of DAILY GUIDE, indicated that there were no letters attached to payment vouchers totaling GH¢41,637.97 of three contracts awarded while purchases worth GH¢122, 041.30 were not routed through the Assembly’s store in contradiction of chapter 5 of section 0529 of Store Regulations.

Furthermore, 10 additional pay vouchers totaling GH¢197, 074.37 were not acknowledged by the beneficiaries while overpayment of GH¢9, 723.50 on seven pay vouchers without the necessary refunds into the Assembly’s account.

The auditors therefore directed the recovery of the amount involved from the affected officers.

The report also showed that special imprest amounting to GH¢23, 511.00 were not retired, resulting from adherence to sections 38 and 39 of the Financial Memorandum for Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDA’s) 2004.

Pay-in-slips for which treasury receipts were issued for revenue collected could equally not be traced and presented for inspection by the auditors while dishonoured cheques of GH¢67, 520.82 were not recovered from taxpayers.

An amount of GH¢541, 538.56, which represents the revenue collected, was not captured in the electronic cash book.

Even though the Assembly claimed to have duly responded to the findings of the audit report, it was however not forthcoming with details on its responses to the paper for reconciliation.

Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the AMA, Nuumo Blafo, who visited the offices of DAILY GUIDE to provide details of the Assembly’s responses to the report, could not provide the supposed copies, which was in his possession.

This, he said, was because he had to seek clearance from the Accra Mayor, Alfred Oko Vanderpuye .

He requested to be given a day or two to produce the evidence.

However, virtually a week after the encounter, nothing was heard from either the Assembly or its PRO, leaving the paper with no option than to go ahead with this publication.

Almost a month after his visit, Nuumo Blafo said he had not secured the document from the Director of Finance to produce as evidence of resolving the issues as contained in the said report.