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It�s now clear to everybody in Ghana that it�s not only Ataa Ayi and his associates who steal, rob and maim fellow citizens in their �operations� but that there are several, several others who have been to school, to universities both in Ghana and abroad, holding master�s and doctorates who live in expensive houses, drive expensive cars and live a very fast and luxurious life but who steal and rob the state of millions of public funds thereby crippling all of us. Ataa Ayi and associates Ataa Ayi and his associates use guns, pistols, knives, crow-bars, screw-drivers and many similar weapons. Sometimes, they even use chloroform to send their victims to sleep before robbing them but when they are caught they are sent to the law courts and prosecuted. In several instances though, when they are caught by an angry mob, they are given instant justice leading to deaths. In the case of the latter group of thieves, who are big time thieves by the way, they use the pen and their brains to steal money belonging to their employers, notably the state. This group of thieves in government employment is hardly ever prosecuted when found out after audit inspection and are invariably left to go scot-free. About 95% of such thieves identified by the audit service and other investigating bodies are still at post and a vast majority of Ghanaians wonder why. Stamping out We can easily stamp out stealing of public funds if the political will is there but it looks as if these thieves who use the pen and brains to hack into government coffers may have their links with the political elite, hence the unwillingness to prosecute them. I was therefore amazed last week when the President of the republic said something in the UK about stealing of public funds which should not have been said by a sitting President. The President told his audience that �weak systems are to blame for the rising spate of corruption (stealing of public funds) in the country.� He added that �efforts by government to tackle the corruption scourge that has become pervasive in almost every sector of the country are being impeded by human discretion and interference.� I am extremely disappointed by what the President had to say about prevention of corruption in this country. It means he is not capable of preventing it or putting any deterrent system in place to check it and is rather putting the blame where it does not lie. What does he mean by �Systems are weak�? It�s he who should check the systems to make sure they work and not the other way round. And by so doing stamp out corruption or minimize it. SADA What has the President done in the matter concerning SADA when the news first broke? As far as many of us can recollect he only replaced the chief executive, Mr. Gilbert Seidu Iddi and later the chairman of the Board, that�s all. What punishment has he meted out to the gentleman who produced a receipt as having bought a lap top computer for GHc6000 or sixty million cedis in the old currency, for SADA? This man should have been sent straight to the High Court on charges of fraud and stealing but he is still at post, presumably. One may even want to know what kind of lap top computer this dishonest public official bought, whether it was specially crafted for the Savannah region or for spacecrafts or for under-water missions. We are not told and the man has been left off the hook. Consultants Four individuals who were already on the pay roll of SADA and were very highly paid were engaged by the same organization to do the same work and paid separately, again very highly, as consultants. The four individuals were Dr. Charles Jebuni as chief technical director who took a total of Ghc437, 206 in a period of 22 months. This translates to Ghc19, 873.00 a month. Wow! Not even the President of the republic takes this money so what informed directors of SADA to pay this colossal sum of money to this �supremo� of a consultant if it�s not open stealing? And stealers ought to be prosecuted. We haven�t heard a word from the President on this gentleman. One Mr. Salifu Mahama was also hired as a consultant for housing engineering and was paid a total sum of Ghc96, 000 for 16 months. This translates to GHc6000 a month. One Bakari Sadiq Nyari was a consultant on Land and he was paid a total sum of Ghc108, 000 for ten months. This translates to GHc10, 800 a month and Mr. Kennedy Mohamed, consultant on Resource Mobilization collected a total of Ghc75, 000 for ten months. This translates to Ghc7, 500 a month. Interestingly, Mr. Kennedy Mohamed could not mobilize one pesewa for the institution and yet he collected this huge sum as his salary. It�s this man who also brought a receipt of GHc6000 for a lap top computer. Punishment What punishment has the President meted out to these dishonest officials? You can�t describe their misdeeds as corruption. What they have done to the state agency entrusted to empower poor indigenes of the northern belt is pure stealing and if you reward stealing rather than punishing the perpetrators, you encourage others to join in the illegal act. You can talk about stealing of public funds at ASONGTABA, GYEEDA, INFOsolutions, GYEEDA, Sports Ministry, GFA, Municipal and District Assemblies and several other places and the only action our President has taken so far is to send 2 GYEEDA officials to court. All the other stealers are walking or rather driving free on the roads of Ghana. London Then, in the face of all these our President goes to London to talk about systems being weak. What systems when we have clear signals that officials entrusted with public funds have diverted the funds into their pockets and are living �on top of the world�? Maputo Games We have a report about the misdeeds of officials who took our athletes to the Maputo Games under NDC government. What has the government done about the colossal sum of money lost by the state but which ended up in the pockets of the organizers? It is not �weak systems� that are preventing the prosecution of the perpetrators of this theft but a weak president who is not capable of running the country effectively and efficiently. Now, everybody is talking about the Brazil fiasco and the first action taken by the President before even thinking of setting up a commission was to transfer the then minister to the presidency. Why did you transfer him if he had done a good job? Why not sack him instantly? Then, you go to London to blame �weak systems� for the stealing that goes on in this country. The President should come again! National Service Secretariat Listen to what we are being told about the happenings at the National Service Secretariat. Do you think if there had been any deterrent in place anybody would dare create ghost names to steal millions of cedis from state coffers? Never! But there is nothing like that in place so the urge is there to steal and to steal big. We now know that stealing at the National Service Secretariat didn�t start yesterday but it had been identified as long ago as between 2010 and 2011 but when the perpetrators were identified they were only asked to refund the money and not prosecuted. Why should this be so when if a man in the street steals a fowl which is less than GHc20 he goes to jail for not less than a year? It is also known that somewhere in the not-so-distant past a sum of Ghc101, 001. 56 identified as salaries was credited to the personal accounts of 4 senior staff members at the headquarters of the Secretariat. These four officials were never sacked but were rather treated with kids� gloves. These thieving officials having been left off the hook, why wouldn�t their colleagues at the Secretariat jump onto the train and cause more harm to the coffers of the state? Operators There is no doubt that the operators of the National Service Scheme may have come to the conclusion that it pays to steal state funds because nothing happens to selfish thieves in the garments of public servants who spirit away state funds to line their pockets. And they have made it big this time at the NSS, lining their pockets with over GH�7000,000 every month over the past several months. The moneys stolen at the NSS alone over the years, when put together can build the interchange at Kwame Nkrumah Circle currently being constructed with borrowed money. This is what we are failing to pay attention to�that we can build our country with our own resources and depend very little on borrowed money but we allow thieves in the apparels of public officials to steal our money and we bemoan the fact that we don�t have money for anything, not even for salaries. We�ve got to wake up as a nation and do what is right in this country. We definitely can stamp out stealing of public funds in this country but our President doesn�t seem to be keen on it for reasons that many of us fail to fathom. It�s certainly not the case that �systems in Ghana are weak� but it�s the President himself who is weak.