CDD reacts to the release of KPMG report

The Centre for Democratic Development Ghana (CDD-Ghana) has expressed satisfaction with the release of the KPMG report concerning the contract between the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) and Strategic Mobilisation Limited (SML).

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo released the report on Wednesday, citing the interest of transparency and openness as the reason.

The report’s release follows the president’s initial refusal to grant a request by the Media Foundation for West Africa for the publication of the full report.

Speaking to Bernard Avle on the Citi Breakfast Show on Citi FM, the Director of Advocacy and Policy Engagement at CDD-Ghana, Dr. Kojo Asante, said that although the release sets a good precedent, the president should respond more promptly to such requests in the future.

“We cannot just close our eyes to these things and [if we do], then we are not holding people accountable. And this is the reason why you are getting so many kinds of infractions in the system. So I think the full report they released, even in terms of the value-for-money arrangement that SML and GRA are making, we still didn’t get any information on what kind of investment SML has made to warrant what they say is a fee-for-performance arrangement.

“So I have many questions that I think need to be followed up to allow this arrangement to go in whatever way that we are thinking about, So I think the release is important.

“It set a good precedent but we should expect that there should be proactive disclosure from the presidency once it took the matter up and said it was in the public interest to do that.”

Source: Citi News