The Asutifi North and Tano South municipalities of the Ahafo Region failed to justify the use of GH¢60,012.50 103 to fuel official vehicles, according to the 2019 report of the Auditor-General.

Contrary to Section 52 of the Public Financial Management Act, 2016 (Act 921), the report said the Coordinating Directors and Finance Officers of the two Assemblies “failed to provide proof of utilisation of fuel purchased totaling GH¢60,012.50 for official vehicles”.

Asutifi North Municipal – GH¢35,013.09 

Tano South Municipal – GH¢24,999.41 

Total – GH¢60,012.50 

According to the report, “there were no entries in the vehicle log books or other evidence to show how the fuel was utilized”, adding: “We attributed the cause of this anomaly to weak supervision over the Assemblies’ drivers”. 

“As a result of the failure to provide proof of the fuel usage, we could not authenticate that the fuel was used in the interest of the Assemblies”, the report noted. 

The Auditor-General recommended that the total amount of GH¢60,012.50 be recovered from the Coordinating Directors and Finance Officers and same paid into the respective Assemblies’ accounts.

Sources of Income 

The report said the six Assemblies in the region operated with a total income of GH¢43,154,075.61 during the year. “This was made up of Internally Generated Funds (IGF), allocations of the District Assemblies Common Fund, Government Salary Grant and support from Ghana’s Development Partners”. 

The total income of GH¢43,154,075.61, it noted, “represented an increase of GH¢6,929,478.59 or 19.1% as compared to 2018 figure of GH¢36,224,597.02”. 

Read excerpts of the report below:

Internally -Generated Funds 

46. The six Assemblies collected total IGF revenue of GH¢8,092,038.34 (Appendix C) during the year. This represented an increase of GH¢181,323.89 as compared to the 2018 figure of GH¢7,910,714.46. Two out of the six Assemblies with increases were, Tano North Municipal (GH¢244,644.29), Tano South Municipal (GH¢61,063.24). The other four Assemblies recorded reductions in IGF with Asunafo North Municipal and Asutifi North of GH¢61,109.41 and GH¢28,962.21 respectively. 

47. The Assemblies collected IGF from, property rates, fees, licences, royalties and other miscellaneous sources for their recurrent expenditure. Ineffective collection strategies, absence of comprehensive records on properties and businesses, award of easily collectible revenues to private firms who were paid up to 30%of amounts collected as commission, all contributed to the Assemblies’ reliance on external incomes from Government and Development Partners. Expenditure and Operational Results 

48. The total expenditure incurred by the six Assemblies amounted to GH¢40,343,724.85 which was less than their total income of GH¢43,154,075.61 resulting in a surplus of GH¢2,810,350.76 (Appendix D). Asutifi North and Asutifi South recorded the highest surpluses of GH¢990,244.27 and GH¢606,275.15 respectively. 

Assets and Liabilities 

49. Total assets of the six Assemblies as at 31 December 2019 was GH¢ 3,782,996.24. These comprised of Cash/Bank balances (GH¢3,727,332.74) Investment (GH¢19,850.00) and Debtors of (GH¢35,813.50). All the six Assemblies had positive cash balances with Asunafo South ending the year with the least balance of GH¢294,647.15. 50. Four Assemblies recorded liabilities totaling GH¢48,149.25 with Asunafo North reporting the highest liabilities of GH¢35,241.00 51.