No wor, no documents, no accountability
By Prince Ahenkorah
The signature sanitation project that former Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia took to the campaign trail in 2024 is now at the centre of a financial scandal. The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has summoned two public officials over GH₵8.2 million in payments linked to the “Toilet for All” initiative funds disbursed for work that never happened.
Bawumia had championed the project as a flagship intervention, promising eight-unit toilet facilities and 24-unit bathhouses across the country. It was meant to burnish his image as a results-oriented administrator ahead of the 2024 election, which the New Patriotic Party (NPP) ultimately lost.
Now, scrutiny has landed on the financial mechanics. Appearing before PAC, Local Government Minister Ahmed Ibrahim disclosed that contractors received mobilisation funds but never moved to site. The contracts were later abrogated by the previous administration and repackaged for re-award, but no construction ever commenced.
The paper trail, however, has gone cold or so the ministry claims. According to Ibrahim, the supporting documents for the payments were sent to the National Archives, complicating verification. PAC members were unconvinced.
“You pay someone mobilisation funds to carry out a project, they take the money without doing the work, and then the contract has to be abrogated, repackaged, and given to someone else. This is unacceptable,” said Samuel Atta-Mills, the committee’s ranking member.
The officials at the centre of the affair are no longer at the sanitation ministry. The minister told the committee that Bright Oduro Kwarteng, the former Director of Finance, is now at the Ministry of Trade and Agribusiness, while Theophilus Okine, the procurement director, has moved to the Ministry of Defence. Both have been directed to appear before PAC with the relevant documents wherever they may be.
For Bawumia, now positioning himself as the NPP’s 2028 flagbearer, the timing is uncomfortable. The “Toilet for All” project was one of the few signature initiatives he could point to outside the digitalisation narrative he has since adopted.
That the project is now mired in allegations of mismanagement and that the officials responsible appear to have been redeployed rather than held to account – will do little to dispel questions about his administrative record.
PAC has signalled that more officials are likely to be summoned in the coming weeks. The central question is whether the documents buried in the archives will ever see the light of day and whether those who authorised payments for phantom projects will face consequences beyond a transfer to another ministry.