Afenyo-Markin calls for stronger enforcement of audit findings across Africa

Alexander Afenyo-Markin, the Minority Leader in Parliament, has called on African countries to move beyond merely identifying financial irregularities and ensure the effective enforcement of audit recommendations to strengthen public accountability. He said public financial accountability could not be measured solely by the number of audit reports produced, officials questioned, or hearings conducted, but by the corrective actions taken, recovery of public funds, and sanctions imposed where wrongdoing had been established. In an address at the opening of the Sixth Conference and General Meeting of the African Organisation of Public Accounts Committees (AFROPAC) in Accra on Monday, Mr Afenyo-Markin said the continent could not continue to “audit the same failures year after year without holding anyone accountable.

” The conference, being attended by Public Accounts Committee members, parliamentary officials, auditors and governance experts from across Africa, is on the theme: “Oversight for Resilience: Strengthening Public Accounts Committees for Accountability in a Changing Financial Landscape. ” Quoting a 2017 Supreme Court ruling in the case of Occupy Ghana vs. Attorney-General, the Minority Leader said the protection of public resources required actionable enforcement, integrity, and statutory authority. He noted that weak financial accountability had real-life consequences for citizens, including inadequate healthcare facilities, poor educational infrastructure, unfinished roads, and limited access to essential public services. “We are living through a period of intense global and continental economic turbulence. African nations are facing severe macroeconomic shocks, expanding debt obligations, inflationary pressures and shrinking fiscal space,” he said. Mr…