The nation’s current asset declaration law, according to Prof. Stephen Adei, a former rector of the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), is “foolish” and unfit for purpose.
He contends that the fact that public officials claim to have disclosed their assets but do not actually disclose them does not promote transparency, necessitating the replacement of the law.
In an interview with GHOne TV, Prof. Stephen Adei mentioned this among other things.
“This foolish thing, you declare your assets and it is locked up in a locker and nobody will even see it again. What we need is an open declaration. So that when you go in and when you are going out everybody will know.
“When you are going in and you declare your asset “somebody will say Stephen Addai is lying when he became a Minister of Education he built ten houses.
“If you declare that you have two houses, other people will say you lied and it should be published,” Prof. Stephen Adei said, as quoted by starrfm.com.gh.
His call comes at a time when Cecilia Abena Dapaah, the former minister for sanitation and water resources, has been charged by the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) for failing to declare her assets within the allotted 30-day period.
The Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) charged Ms. Dapaah with violating section 69(1)(a) of the Office of the Special Prosecutor Act, 2017 (Act 959) by “failing to comply with a lawful demand of an authorized officer of the Office of the Special Prosecutor in the Performance of his function” in a Charge Sheet submitted on October 6, 2023.
After her resignation on July 22, 2023, the OSP launched an investigation into her for corruption and offenses related to corruption as a result of reports that large sums of cash in various denominations were discovered in her home.
