GCAA accused of blowing cash on Board Members

The Ghana Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) has been accused of spending some 40 thousand pounds on flying board members to a technical meeting in the United Kingdom (UK).

Member of Parliament for Okaikoi North, Patrick Boamah says apart from spending the 40 thousand pounds on airlifting the board members to the UK, each board member also pocketed a colossal 10 thousand dollars as per diem, a figure he describes as outrageous especially for a 7 day programme.

He wants President John Mahama through the Minister of transport to institute a commission of enquiry to look into the whole matter to ensure that the tax payer’s money is protected and not frivolously spent on areas that are not prioritized.

Mr. Patrick Boamah said if the rationale of the meeting was to get officials of the GCAA to familiarise themselves with the workings of the UK Civil Aviation Institute, which has been described as technical in nature, the proper thing would have been to rather send technical staff of the Authority to the programme and not the board members whose mandate is to give policy direction among others to the Authority.

In his opinion sending one or two members of the board to the UK or even bringing down a consultant from the UK to train them here in Ghana would have been a better option and less costly than sending all the 11 or 12 board members to the UK.

But in a sharp rebuttal, Deputy Director General of the Ghana Civil Aviation Authority in charge of technical, Martey Boye Atoklo has debunked the assertion saying that even though it is true that they sent board members to the UK for the particular meeting, it is not correct that they each took 10 thousand dollars as per diem.

Without mentioning the specific figure that the Board members took as per diem, Mr. Atoklo said they each took what was guaranteed them as stipulated in their conditions as board members.

Justifying why technical staff of the Authority were not taken but the board members, he said the board members were sometimes confronted with tough decisions that were technical in nature and required such expertise.