4 Top Officials Of GIPC Interdicted

Scandal and drama is unfolding at the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre following an audacious attempt by the first female Chief Executive of the Centre, Mawuena Trebarh, to restore sanity and transparency in the operations of her outfit.

Following a series of scandalous audit reports gleaned by this medium we can confirm that at least four management officials of the organisation have been interdicted pending the outcome of an investigation instituted by the Board of Directors of the centre.

Documents available to us confirm that A.R. Mahama, Director of Finance, Head of Finance, Kenneth Doh, Director of Marketing and Public Relations Edward Ashong -Lartey and Vivian Agyepong, an Administrative and Protocol Officer have been slapped with letters informing them of their interdiction in order to enable a Disciplinary Committee constituted by the Board to investigate audit finding brought against them.

Preliminary directives made to the committee, recommend the outright dismissal of the affected officers. Investigations by the Daily Post revealed damning audit findings dating back to 2011 and 2012, which expose a series of fraudulent financial and administrative practices within the nation's flagship investment promotion organisation.

GIPC Officials were tight-lipped when we tried to confirm details of the disciplinary shake-up, but we can confirm that the audit findings exposed serious infractions on the financial management of the organisation including the payment of funds belonging to the authority into the private bank account of one of the affected officials.

Legal Director, A.R. Mahama reportedly paid an amount of ¢20,900 of the centre's funds into his personal account in gross violation of Public Service regulations.

A letter recommending disciplinary action against Mr Mahama said: 'It is not known how long this huge amount of public funds have been kept in his personal account without the knowledge of management of the Centre'

An internal audit report dated 28th May 2013 indicated among others that there were irregular bank reconciliation of the Centre's finances, no documented treasury process and no documented security policies.

The report also exposed the lack of a documented payroll process as well as the lack of a clearly defined salary structure.

Others included the lack of a transport policy, non-compliance of vehicle use controls and non-availability of a fleet register.

The audit report also exposed a high premium cost on foreign travel tickets as well as inadequate documentation on cost of air travel tickets procured for the centre.

Irregularities in the payment of duty allowances and board secretariat allowances were questioned by the internal audit report.

New CEO, Mrs Trebarh was appointed in February this year following the resignation of her predecessor to contest the Ahanta West Parliamentary seat, which he won.

Sadly, her grand investment drive to change the outlook of the Centre has been bogged by internal problems caused by the stubbornness of an in-house mafia some of whom have been in the organisation's employment for over a decade and deem themselves untouchable. The Daily Post will bring readers an update of the tsunami (tidal wave) which has hit the GIPC and exposed four key personnel there.

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