Chartered accountants asked to apply principles and ethics of their profession

Accra, April 10, GNA - The Minister of Education, Mr. Alex Tetteh-Enyo, has charged chartered accountants to apply the principles and ethics of their profession to uphold their integrity.

He reminded them that all professionals were obliged to be transparent, accountable and have high sense of integrity.

Mr. Tetteh-Enyo made the call in a speech read on his behalf by Professor Paul Buatsi, Acting Chief Director at the Ministry of Education, at the graduation ceremony of the Institute of Chartered Accountants, in Accra on Saturday.

The Minister said "It is necessary that you exhibit high level of responsibility, skill and competency akin to the quality of training you have received" to ensure significant progress at work places towards increased productivity.

He said that government was committed to tackling corruption and asked chartered accountants to use their expertise to help solve the problem.

Mr. Tetteh-Enyo said that white collar crime had become sophisticated with the advancement of technology and asked the graduands to become abreast with the trend to enable them to identify loopholes and provide solutions to the problem.

He said chartered accountants should play roles in the preparation of budget statements, financial reports and apply the expertise in their work.

Mr. Tetteh-Enyo said government would count on chartered accountants to promote growth and productivity.

He said the growth of departments, organisations and institutions would be dependent on the strategy and planning presented to boards and managements, adding "Your commitment to bringing these plans into fruition is what would largely determine your success as a professionals".

Mr. Tetteh-Enyo called on chartered accountants to support government to ensure economic growth to help improve the lives of the citizenry.

Professor Yaw Agyeman Badu, Rector of Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration, called for increased capacity building, particularly in the area of human resource towards national development.

He noted that even though Africa was endowed with enormous natural resources, the continent remained the least developed region in the world, struggling with poverty, poor infrastructure, global marginalization, climate change among others.

Prof. Badu said that even though lack of capacity development has been identified as a cause of Africa's problem, it was least appreciated in the public.

He said that the recent practice of entrusting local capacity development programmes to foreign experts, who determined development priorities, had proved expensive and unsustainable and had failed to yield the expected results.

Prof. Badu the need for Ghana and Africa to embrace a new paradigm and pursue developmental change that would be envisioned, owned and implemented by the society under capable leadership and dedicated working individuals within the framework of viable and credible institutions.

He said "Without an environment of good governance, the capacity development initiatives will yield minimal results".

And called on government to empower individuals, institutions and the society.

In all, 231 members graduated with Ms Vivian .L Worlanyo-Deh as the best female candidate.

GNA