The Wa and Jirapa Municipal Assemblies have been cited by the 2020 Auditor General Report on the use of the District Assemblies Common Fund of financial acts that is considered to be ‘cash irregularities’. Meaning, the two assemblies expended cash amounts for the 2020 financial year totaling 832,964.84 Ghana Cedis without due regards to the law.
Section 25 of the Public Financial Management Acts, 2016 (Act 921) states ‘where covered entities enters into a contracts or any other arrangements that commits or purports to commit Governments to make a payment, the contract or the arrangement shall be approved by the Principal Spending Officer of that covered entity and the Principal Spending Officer shall enter the contract or the arrangement into the Ghana Integrated Financial Management Payment Information System’.
The Wa Municipal Assembly in contrast to this law expended a total of 582,208.34 Ghana Cedis involving 45 separate payment vouchers without entering the transactions into the Ghana Integrated Financial Management Payment Information System.
Acting Jirapa MCE Madam Christine Bombanye-Amadu
The Jirapa Municipal assembly equally committed the same financial offence by also paying a sum of 250,756.50 involving 2 separate PVs without recourse to the Public Financial Management Act, 2016.
The two Municipal Assemblies however ascribed their failure to adhere to the Public Financial Management Acts to system failure.
The Auditor General has therefore called on Coordinating Directors and Finance Officers to always make it a point to report to the GIFMIS secretariat whenever they have challenges regarding the use of the platform instead of resorting to financial acts that contravenes the Public Financial Management Act, 2016.