Osafo Maafo Pushes For Asset Register To Prevent Theft Of Govt Property

It has emerged that the various Ministries Departments and Agencies(MDAs) do not have Asset registers to properly document and track government properties.

The absence of this compelling tool will be difficult for incoming governments to ascertain the true records of the assets the outgoing government is leaving behind.

Speaking at the review of the 2017 Presidential Transition Review Forum, Senior Minister, Yaw Osafo Maafo pushed for a law to compel the Ministries to have Asset registers.

“We have a major weakness when people talk about Assets to the nation. No ministry in Ghana has Assets register. So when you don’t have asset register, how do you take over the assets of the country. Any company that runs any where, one of the importance documents of the company is your Assets register. The Assets register will detail out the assets of the company. And therefore, if you go to any Ministry in this country, there should be an asset register, you can’t blame any government but we don’t have it, which details out all the assets of that Ministry. It could be your photocopiers, everything should be there, but we don’t have it. So when people are talking about you taking over, what Assets are you taking over? What is the basis of your reference? When the Ministries don’t have assets register; we don’t and it’s within the Financial Management Regulations to have Assets register, except that it is not being implemented.

“The Auditor General if you look at his report, always talk about Assets register. We need law to enforce it, or otherwise it is going to be very difficult for anybody to talk about taking over the Assets of the country.”