Foreign Affairs Ministry asks Auditor-General to audit evacuations since 2017

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has asked the Auditor-General to conduct a special audit of all evacuation exercises undertaken by the Ministry since 2017, following the successful evacuation of Ghanaians from South Africa.

The proposed audit will cover the recent evacuation from South Africa, the 2020 COVID-19 evacuation, the 2022 evacuation from Ukraine and the 2023 evacuation from Sudan.

In a statement outlining additional accountability measures, the Ministry said the request was intended to strengthen transparency and accountability in the management of public funds used for evacuation exercises.

It said it had also submitted a comprehensive report on the South Africa evacuation to Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee.

The Ministry further disclosed that it had responded to a Right to Information (RTI) request from the Minority by submitting more than 200 pages of an accountability report detailing various aspects of the exercise.

According to the statement, the report includes a breakdown of expenditure, receipts, and the names and telephone contacts of all 1,964 Ghanaians evacuated from South Africa.

The Ministry said records available to it showed that the South Africa evacuation was among the least costly evacuation exercises undertaken by the country.

It put the total cost of the operation at GH¢49,721,786, saying the amount was comparable to the GH¢44,460,530 spent on quarantine alone during the 2020 COVID-19 evacuation.

The Ministry noted that the quarantine expenditure was incurred even though most Ghanaians evacuated during the pandemic were required to pay for their quarantine from their own resources.

It described the South Africa evacuation as the Ministry’s most transparent exercise, insisting that it was conducted with integrity and financial prudence.

The additional measures follow the Ministry’s disclosure of the total cost of the South Africa evacuation, as it seeks to demonstrate accountability in the use of public funds.

Read the statement below:

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