Serious Fraud Office under pressure..?

The Ghanaian Times reports that pressure is on the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) to stop its investigations into the use and disbursement of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly's Poverty Alleviation Fund.

The Times, in a front-page story, says the brakes are being applied by some top officials of the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC) - the body to which Kojo Yankah was posted and turned it down by resigning from the govt, but the SFO is determined 'to blow off the lid.'

Attributing this revelation to a source close to the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, the paper says that the SFO had refused to yield to the pressure and was going on with investigations. According to the source, the NDPC officials were trying to cover up a large-scale corruption and embezzlement of the Fund at the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA).

"When compared, the exposed fraud associated with the Poverty Alleviation Fund at the Afram Plains District Assembly is a child's play", the Times quotes the source as saying.

The source says apart from the failed attempt to stop the investigations the NDPC officials also prevailed upon the SFO to allow them to bring their choice of auditors to audit the books of the AMA Poverty Alleviation Fund.