Ghana’s Auditor-General, Dr Pamela Graham, has pledged to fully exercise her constitutional powers of disallowance and surcharge against persons found to have incurred unlawful public expenditure.
Dr Graham, Ghana’s first female Auditor-General, also announced that the Ghana Audit Service would, from October 2026, deploy an Audit Recommendations Tracker on its website to publicly monitor the implementation of audit recommendations and provide greater visibility on recoveries.
She made the announcement in Accra at the launch of the 2026 financial year audit, held on the theme: “Strengthening accountability in public institutions: Building trust through collaboration and action.”
As of February 2026, about GH¢280.5 million in surcharges remained outstanding, while approximately GH¢57.2 million had been collected through the Auditor-General’s recovery account since 2022.
“Where our work establishes that expenditure has been incurred contrary to the law, I will exercise the powers of disallowance and surcharge that the Constitution vests in the Auditor-General,” Dr Graham said.
She, however, stressed that surcharges would not be imposed arbitrarily. Persons affected would first be issued notices and given 14 days to respond. Where a response is deemed unsatisfactory, a certificate would be served, giving the affected person 60 days to lodge an appeal.
Dr Graham said every cedi lost through financial irregularities represented resources that could otherwise be invested in education, healthcare, infrastructure and social protection.
“The resources we audit belong to the people of Ghana; every cedi lost through weak controls, unlawful expenditure, inefficiency or failure to act, is a cedi withheld from education, healthcare, infrastructure and social protection,” she said.
She added that the responsibility of auditors went beyond identifying irregularities to establishing the facts, applying the law, ensuring weaknesses were addressed and helping prevent similar failures from recurring.
Audit Service to Expand Use of Technology
On technology, Dr Graham said the Audit Service would expand its use of data analytics, data-driven auditing and appropriately governed artificial intelligence to progressively move beyond limited samples to whole-population analysis where data quality permitted.
She said the Service had also developed an in-house Correspondence Management System to receive and manage official communications from audited entities.
According to her, the system would improve efficiency and traceability while reducing reliance on paper, in line with environmental, social and governance requirements.
The Audit Recommendations Tracker, expected to be deployed in October 2026, will show implemented and outstanding recommendations, amounts identified, pursued and recovered, as well as systemic weaknesses that continue to expose public resources to risk.
Dr Graham said the 2026 audit would be anchored on five pillars: continuous engagement, timeliness, technology, people and impact.
The approach, she explained, was intended to ensure that the accountability process did not end after audit reports were tabled in Parliament.
She also emphasised the need for timely auditing, citing Article 187(5) of the 1992 Constitution, which requires the Auditor-General to submit reports to Parliament within six months after the end of each financial year.
She urged all covered entities to prepare and submit their records on time to facilitate the audit process.
The Auditor-General said the Service’s mandate covered more than 7,000 institutions annually, including over 5,000 Ministries, Departments and Agencies and Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies.
The mandate also extends to thousands of pre-tertiary educational institutions, 116 state-owned enterprises, 79 public boards and corporations, 60 traditional councils, as well as donor-funded and other special audit entities nationwide.
PAC Raises Concern Over Outstanding Surcharges
Madam Abena Osei-Asare, Chairperson of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), expressed concern over the GH¢280.5 million in outstanding surcharges.
“The problem is not enough reporting; it’s also not enough even debating on it in Parliament, without enough follow-through,” she said.
She called for a shift from episodic to continuous accountability, supported by technology-enabled systems linking procurement records, payroll data, tax reports and asset registers to detect anomalies before they resulted in audit findings and financial losses.
The PAC Chairperson said accountability was ultimately about public trust.
“When it fails repeatedly, the nation loses more than money – it loses public trust, which is far more difficult to recover than money,” she said.
Calls for Stronger Enforcement and Professional Capacity
Professor Francis Dodoo, Presidential Advisor on the National Anti-Corruption Programme, urged the Audit Service to fully enforce its punitive powers to deter misappropriation.
He called on the Auditor-General to make surcharge rates sufficiently punitive, including setting them above prevailing Treasury bill market rates, to strengthen their deterrent effect and ensure stricter enforcement of recoveries.
Dr David Ofosu-Dorte, Legal and Business Strategist, supported the exercise of disallowance and surcharge powers but cautioned that some audit reports had been successfully challenged in court over quality-related lapses.
He called for stronger training and professional capacity within the Audit Service to improve the quality of audit reports.
Dr Ofosu-Dorte also urged greater coordination among the Police Service, Internal Audit Agency, Value for Money Office and Office of the Special Prosecutor to prevent financial losses while avoiding unnecessary duplication of audits.
Such coordination, he said, should also help prevent the harassment of investors whose activities were subject to regulatory and audit scrutiny.
He further urged the Audit Service to move urgently from manual auditing to technology-driven systems, including the adoption of AI-assisted accounting and auditing tools.
