Ghana – Gh¢50m payroll fraud exposed at YEA

Managers of the Youth Employment Agency (YEA) say they have uncovered massive payroll fraud at the Agency which has caused the country to lose over GH¢50 million.

This is contained in an internal audit findings conducted by the Agency.

Briefing the media on the findings Wednesday June 7, the acting CEO of the Agency, Justin Frimpong Kodua explained that the amount is an accumulation of unearned allowances paid to unposted beneficiaries, funds for official use which curved into personal accounts as well as procurement without recourse to due process.

Also, he said, some 2,700 beneficiaries did not have appointment letters, while some 9000 were above the age required to get enrolled with the Agency, other group of 4700 vacated their post with 14000 were non-existent.

“In view of these anomalies the Agency suspended the payment of beneficiary allowance in order to conduct a comprehensive audit into the beneficiary payment. This decision duly communicated to the beneficiaries and the General Public via a statement issued by the management on February 19, 2017,” he told the media.

Giving a breakdown of the amount, Mr. Kodua said the deletion of 2999 beneficiaries from the Agency’s payroll saved the nation over GHS4million for the four months duration of suspension of payment— from February to May.

He said on the basis “of these mind blowing revelations” management of the Agency commissioned the Internal Audit Agency to conduct a special audit into the operations of the agency—specifically in 45 selected districts across the country and the regional offices of the agency.

Reading portions of the findings of the draft report from the internal audit, he said payments of unearned allowances to beneficiaries who vacated their post amounted to over GHS1million.

Also, he said funds meant for official use paid into personal accounts amounted to over GHS5million; supporting documents for payment not sighted amounted to over GHS1million, procurement without adherence to due process amounted to over GHS85000.

Mr. Kodua added management of the agency through the monitoring and evaluation unit conducted physical verification of beneficiaries in each 216 districts of the country based on the work on the Internal audit Agency.

The issue, he said has been referred to the National Security for further investigations.

Source: Starrfmonline.com