Fired for turning down dodgy voucher

There is uneasiness at the survey department of the Ministry of Mines, Lands and Forestry over possible corrupt activities when a principal accountant was transferred after her refusal to sign vouchers that she considers to be dodgy and calculated to perpetrate fraud.

Ms Elizabeth N.A Amoo was asked to vacate her seat after detecting a deal that cost the organization almost ¢1.2 b in underhand deals.

Ms Amoo was given a deadline of October 4, 2004 to pack her belongings and move to the Ministry of Education or face possible action.

According to a daily newspaper The Heritage she said almost five months after assuming duties at the survey department, she detected an anomaly in the financial structure of the organization, which some individuals have been exploiting.

So after signing an initial voucher of almost ¢700million for what she believes was for an illegal payment, she resolved never to sign such vouchers again unless she is convinced that there are no under hand dealings.

However within some days another vouchers was brought to her for signing but she smelt a rat and told the authorities that she was not going to sign it because it was fraudulent.

So the authorities at the survey department by passed her and gave the voucher to her subordinate to sign.

Consequently, she asked that her subordinate be transferred for what she sees as an abuse of accounting procedures.

According to her this infuriated the authorities at the survey department who then wrote to the controller and accountant general office to have her transferred to a different institution for her reluctance to sign the said vouchers.

To her dismay the Controller and Accountant General endorsed her transfer to the Ministry of Education with effect from October 4,2004.

She said she defied the order to vacate her post but the survey department forced her out of office.

She said even though she refused to accept posting to the ministry of education, her salary is being paid every month for the last nine months for no job done.