According to the Public Accounts Committee in Parliament, nine assemblies spent more than Four million Ghana cedis on workshops, fuel, honorarium and other expenses.
This was discovered during the Zone four (4) public hearing of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) in Takoradi, Western Region.
According to the 2022 Auditor-General’s Report, this has resulted in an excess expenditure of Gh₵ 2,706,135.00.
Explaining further in the Report, the Auditor-General noted that part 1 of the 2019 Guidelines for utilisation of the DACF requires that up to 10 per cent of the allocations to the Assemblies should be disbursed on administrative expenditure.
The report added that nine Assemblies received a total Common Fund allocation of GHc 20,977,699.78 with an allowable 10 per cent of GH₵ 2,097,769.98 for administrative expenditure.
The Auditor-General recommended in the report that the Management of the nine Assemblies should refund the excess expenditure of Gh₵ 2,706,134.55 from their Internal Generated Fund (IGF) accounts into the DACF accounts and desist from violating the guidelines.
Later, the Chairman of the Committee, Hon. James Klutse-Avedzi noted that the Committee will strongly recommend in its final report to Parliament that all expenditures exceeding the required 10 per cent for administrative purposes should be rejected on the GIFMIS platform.
This, he believes will help solve the over-utilisation of Common Fund on administrative expenses within the Assemblies.
