Dr. Kwame Asiedu Sarpong, a Research Fellow at the Ghana Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana), accuses the government of embezzling money under the pretense of Covid-19.
The pharmacist claimed that the enormous quantities of money donated to the government should have been sufficient to prevent the nation’s present debt issue.
A total of GH21.8 billion was raised to lessen the pandemic’s effects in Ghana.
However, the government is currently requesting a $3 billion bailout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
The Auditor General’s report on Covid-19 expenditure between May 2020 and June 2022 was published as the government is implementing the contentious Domestic Debt Exchange programme.
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According to the CDD fellow, it is impossible to accept the government’s use of the pandemic response measures as justification for the financial crisis given the infractions detailed in the aforementioned report.
“In actual fact, Covid gave us a bounty based on what the Auditor-General has said. We are at the IMF and our economy is in shambles because we used Covid as a facade to do bad things. Very bad things. Extremely bad and diabolical things. We used Covid to plunder the state,” he said on Monday.
Dr Sarpong made these comments on Joy FM‘s Super Morning Show on Monday.
He called for a “spirited campaign to get the monies retrieved.”
However, due to precedent, the pharmacist was not very optimistic that this would be achievable.
“How much of Woyome’s money have we been able to retrieve anyway?” he quizzed.
The Auditor-General’s report also disclosed that the government spent GH¢10 billion of the GH¢21.8 billion mobilised for Covid-19 activities on budget support.
According to the A-G, a total of GH¢21,844,189,185.24 was mobilised for the fight against the pandemic.
Only GH¢11,750,683,059.11 of this sum, however, was used to stop the virus’s spread.
Source: Myjoyonline
