New Juaben Assembly must identify risk projects
The New Juaben Municipal Assembly must at all times identify risk projects to prevent state funds from being channelled into them.
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This is because such risk projects, which may not be in the interest of the people, normally takes away huge sums of money at the expense of other viable and appropriate projects earmarked for the communities.
Mr Angelo Habib, a Director of Internal Audit at the University of Ghana, made the assessment at the New Juaben Audit Report Implementation Committee (ARIC) workshop at Koforidua last Monday.
In attendance were finance officers, internal auditors and some assembly members. They were taken through the rudiments of financial control in the implementation of projects and other services by the assembly.
According to Mr Habib, although the communities are to be provided with social amenities, the implementation of some of the projects can be a risk for the assembly and should, therefore, not be undertaken.
Technocrats
Mr Habib, therefore, called on the technocrats of the assemblies to endeavor to identify the risk projects before funds were channelled for their execution.
That, he indicated, would prevent public funds from going waste.
“Projects are to be carried out by the assemblies but the implementation of some of them will be a risk because a lot of money will be wasted at the expense of other appropriate projects which should be executed at all cost,” Mr Habib stated.
MCE & PM
The New Juaben Municipal Chief Executive (MCE), Dr Kwaku Owusu Acheampong, gave an assurance that prudent measures had been taken by the assembly to ensure judicious use of its financial resources for the provision of numerous social amenities and other poverty- alleviatory programmes in the municipality.
The Presiding Member of the assembly, Mr Boadi Sarpong, also indicated his resolve to ensure that the assembly’s funds would be judiciously managed.
The Director-General of the Internal Audit Agency (IAA), Mr Kwabena T. Obese-Jecty, who also addressed the participants, was of the view that assemblies should mobilise more internally generated funds to support the government in carrying out development projects in the communities.
That, he indicated, had become necessary since the government alone could not provide all the needed funds for such projects.
Mr Obese-Jecty called for harmonious working relations between finance officers attached to the assemblies who would see to the dispensation of funds allocated for the projects and internal auditors responsible for the judicious utilisation of the funds.
Later in the day, a nine-member ARIC committee for the assembly, which included the MCE and the PM, was inaugurated to oversee the judicious application of funds for the assembly’s projects and programmes.
Daily Graphic/Ghana