The Coronavirus pandemic has caused significant discomfort to family and economic life since Ghana recorded its first case early last year.
Even as the delta variant continues to wreak more havoc on an economy on life support, and families become saddled with sadness over the worsening conditions in the country, it has become clear that others mainly seek to line their pockets even if it means letting the whole country die of Coronavirus.
For the umpteenth time, government officials have been caught red-handed profiteering from COVID-19, as they use the Ghana Airforce to pocket at least US$ 300,000 while evacuating stranded Ghanaians from West and Central Africa back to Ghana.
Accounts given to the Ghanaian Parliament on Thursday, July 22, 2021, by Foreign Minister Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey shows that when each of the 506 Ghanaians evacuated from West African and Central African countries back to Ghana cost Ghana almost US$ 1,000.
Mind you, this US$ 1,000 per head was spent when the country used Ghana’s own state-funded Airforce planes.
Interestingly, when private foreign airlines did the same evacuation from much farther countries like Lebanon, the UAE and China, it cost the Ghanaian government only an average of US$330 for each evacuee.
Ranking Member on the Foreign Affairs Committee of Parliament, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa pointed out a potential GHC 21 million pocketed by officials of the Akufo Addo administration on quarantine expenses for Ghanaians from Lebanon.
“Strangely, whereas government says it spent GHS46,398,452 on Ghanaians from Lebanon at page 273 of the 2021 Budget, the Foreign Minister accounted for less than GHS25million of that amount in Parliament on Thursday. No one knows what happened to the over GHS21million missing as she couldn’t provide satisfactory answers to my supplementary questions despite her best efforts,” stated Okudzeto.
Source: GhanaFeed.Com
