Ghana’s Auditor-General, Dr Pamela Graham, announced plans to enforce surcharges on unlawful expenditures and launch a public Audit Recommendations Tracker by October 2026. The announcement came at the launch of the 2026 financial year audit in Accra, under the theme “Strengthening accountability in public institutions: Building trust through collaboration and action.”
As of February 2026, GH¢280.5 million in surcharges remained unpaid, while GH¢57.2 million had been recovered through the Auditor-General’s recovery account since 2022. Dr Graham said the Ghana Audit Service would fully exercise its constitutional powers of disallowance and surcharge against persons responsible for unlawful expenditure. “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,” she said.
She clarified that surcharges would not be imposed arbitrarily. Individuals would receive a notice and have 14 days to respond. If the response was unsatisfactory, a certificate would be served, allowing a 60-day window to lodge an appeal. Dr Graham emphasized that every cedi lost through financial irregularities represented funds withheld from 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. That is the meaning of accountability, and that is how public trust is built,” she said.
The Audit Recommendations Tracker, set for deployment in October 2026, will publicly monitor the implementation of audit recommendations and provide visibility on recoveries. It will display implemented and outstanding recommendations, amounts identified, pursued, and recovered, alongside systemic weaknesses that continue to expose public resources to risk.
Dr Graham said the 2026 audit would rest on five pillars: continuous engagement, timeliness, technology, people, and impact. She noted that the accountability chain must extend beyond the tabling of audit reports in Parliament. She cited Article 187(5) of the 1992 Constitution, which requires audit reports to be submitted to Parliament within six months after the end of each financial year. She urged all covered entities to prepare and submit their records promptly.
The Ghana Audit Service’s mandate covers more than 7,000 institutions annually, including over 5,000 Ministries, Departments and Agencies, Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies, 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.
On technology, Dr Graham said the Audit Service would expand the use of data analytics, data-driven auditing and appropriately governed artificial intelligence to move from limited samples to whole-population analysis where data quality permits. The Service developed an in-house Correspondence Management System to manage official communications from audited entities, improving efficiency and traceability while reducing paper use, aligning with environmental, social and governance requirements.
Madam Abena Osei-Asare, Chairperson of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), expressed concern about 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, with technology-enabled systems linking procurement records, payroll data, tax reports and asset registers to detect anomalies early, before they resulted in audit findings and financial losses. “When it fails repeatedly, the nation loses more than money – it loses public trust, which is far more difficult to recover than money,” she added.
Professor Francis Dodoo, Presidential Advisor on the National Anti-Corruption Programme, urged the Audit Service to enforce its punitive powers fully to deter misappropriation. He recommended surcharge rates 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 exercising disallowance and surcharge powers but warned that some audit reports had been successfully challenged in court over quality lapses. He called for stronger training and professional capacity within the Audit Service to improve report quality. He 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 and avoid unnecessary duplication of audits. Such coordination, he said, would help prevent harassment of investors facing regulatory and audit scrutiny.
Dr Ofosu-Dorte further called on the Audit Service to transition urgently from manual auditing to technology-driven systems.
The Ghana Audit Service’s plans reveal a push not only to recover lost funds but also to increase transparency through public tracking and technology, aligning with broader demands for accountability in public finance.
According to Joy Online.
