Accountability is an obligation or willingness to accept responsibility or account for one’s actions.  It is often used in the context of individuals taking responsibility for their actions.  An example is when an employee admits an error he or she made on a particular project.

IMPORTANCE OF ACCOUNTABILITY

Accountability is so important because it eliminates the time and effort spent on distracting activities and other unproductive behaviour.  When you make people accountable for their actions, it means you are effectively teaching them to value their work.  For leaders to be accountable, they need to be committed to the business and its people.  They must regard their role as leaders of people and build trust among team members.  Leaders who are accountable, clearly communicate their goals and objectives and foster alignment and team focus.

Having stated what accountability connotes and how a leader is supposed to adopt and apply it to advance the course of progress, I am inclined to dwell on the recent development in our country where the Minority group in Parliament is crying foul over how moneys set aside by the government for the management of the deadly Corona Virus pandemic (COVID-19) were expended since 2020.

ACCOUNTABILITY OF COVID-19 FUNDS

Within the last few weeks, proceedings in parliament had not been smooth sailing between the Majority and the Minority caucuses in what looked like a war of words over this particular issue of expenditure of COVID-19 funds.  The Minority has not been comfortable with the figures at their disposal and, therefore requested the Speaker, Mr. Alban Kingsford Sumani Bagbin to summon the Finance Minister, Mr. Ken Ofori-Atta,to appear before the House to answer questions relating to the issue.

For a number of weeks after the Speaker had issued the invitation to the Finance Minister to appear before the Legislature, he failed to be present citing reasons such as engagement with other government businesses and that he needed more time to put together his answers to how the expenditure was conducted by the various agencies.

SPEAKER’S SUMMONS TO FINANCE MINISTER

Not appeared to be happy with the continued absence of the Minister to the Chamber, the Speaker directed the Finance Committee to suspend all deliberations on the 75 million Euro facility for a COVID-19 response programme currently before the House for consideration.  Hear him; “Until we go through the accountability process, we will not take that motion.  Today, he has another request before us.  That will also be affected.  Until he comes to respond to the questions and to submit the statement giving an explanation as to how the money has been applied, we will not entertain any business from the ministry.”

The Speaker, we are told, gave the ruling despite admitting that there had been communication through the Majority Leader by the Finance Minister about his non-availability to appear before the House.  That was after he (Speaker) had held a meeting with the leadership of the House.  According to him when questions were asked of ministers, the House expected them to come and answer them and quoted Standing Order 61 of Parliament to buttress his point.

To refresh the minds of my readers and patrons, Standing Order 61 states that, “Ministers shall by order of the House be requested to attend to sittings of the House to answer questions asked them.”  The Speaker further cited Standing Order 60 (3) which also states that, “A minister shall not take more than three weeks to respond to questions of the House.”  He indicated that based on the Standing Order of Parliament, the Business Committee of the House was given the opportunity to do the allotment and, thus, allotted June 16, for the Finance Minister to come and answer some questions that stood in the name of his ministry.

EXCUSES FROM FINANCE MINISTER NOT TO APPEAR IN PARLIAMENT

“The Finance Minister told us that he would not be available today and before today.  I gave a directive to the effect that the Minister appears before this house to accept money that we approved for him to use to lead the country in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.  A lot of questions have been raised, so we expected the Minister to come and account as to how state resources had been applied to the benefit of the people.  I just indicated that until that was done, a motion requesting for approval of the House for money to be given to the Ministry of Finance for the purpose of COVID-19 will be on hold,” said the Speaker.

Before the Speaker gave his ruling, the Minority had expressed its displeasure over the Minister’s inability to honour the invitation.  The Deputy Minority Chief Whip, Ahmed Ibrahim, we are told, expressed misgiving about the attitude of the minister saying that it looked as if he was taking Parliament for granted, adding that the oversight responsibility of the House was not to be taken lightly at all.  He warned that his side (Minority), was not ready to take any motion relating to the Ministry of Finance until the minister appeared before the House, adding that the minister’s failure to appear before the House meant he was avoiding accountability.

MAJORITY AND MINORITY LEADERS’ REACTIONS

On his part, the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu, made it clear that his side was demanding accountability in the interest of Ghanaians.  He said the minister needed to come and account for an amount of GH¢9.7 billion COVID-19 expenses.

However, the Majority Leader, Osei Kyei-Mensah Bonsu, refuted the claim that the minister was running away from accountability, explaining that he needed some information from the technocrats concerning the expenses on COVID-19 for which he would need time to read through before facing the House.  He said the minister wanted Parliament to reschedule his appearance to Wednesday, June 22, 2022, to enable him to come before the House and answer questions on all expenses on COVID-19.

FINANCE MINISTER FINALLY REPORT TO THE HOUSE

True to his words and assurance, the Finance Minister made an appearance on the stipulated date to respond to the various questions from the parliamentarians.

According to the minister, the government had been transparent and prudent in the management of the COVID-19 funds and that all expenses were provided for in the last budget.  Giving details, the minister said out of the GH¢18.19 billion the government mobilised from the various sources of funds in 2020, out of the programmed GH¢19.3 billion, GH¢12 billion was spent.  He gave a total breakdown of how the moneys were received and expended which I do not intend to bore my readers with for lack of space.

SPEAKER ORDERS PROBE INTO COVID-19 EXPENDITURE

However, the Minority realised the inconsistencies in the figures as compared to what was contained in the President’s State of the Nation Address and called on the Speaker to institute an enquiry into the matter.  It appears the Speaker has agreed to the Minority’s request and has directed the Committees of Finance and Health to investigate the expenditure and report to the House the first week of the next meeting of the House in October this year. It is the hope of Ghanaians that the committees will work diligently to ensure a vivid accountability of moneys so far invested in the management of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic which still rages on.  Failure to do a good job will enable the international community which provided some of the funds to mitigate the situation during that period to lose confidence in us.

VIBRANCY AND POTENCY OF THE LEGISLATURE

It is now becoming increasingly clear that this particular parliament is no more the rubber stamp that it used to be in the past when things were done haphazardly or sometimes swept under the carpet.  Parliament of today is indeed, biting because of the very nature of composition and the fact that the Speaker is coming from the major opposition party (NDC). The hung nature of parliament, with the Majority having the same numerical strength with the Minority,137-137 with one independent MP aligning to the majority side has instilled vibrancy in the Legislature and encourages dialogue and consensus building on various issues.  So far, the Minority has been resolute and putting the Majority side on check.  The Speaker has also stood firmly on his grounds making proceedings in the house very attractive and interesting.  It is significant to recall an issue like the passage of the E-Levy, which went through some form of hectic moments because of the Minority’s stance on the issue before it was finally passed into law.

Judging from what is unfolding in our legislative arm of government, where issues are debated with clear minds and conscience by our parliamentarians under the effective guidance of the Speaker, it appears that the country is making a significant progress in our democratic experiment.  This is a sign that if we continue on that path, we will surely and eventually make progress within the shortest possible time.

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By Charles Neequaye