President Nana Akufo-Addo has suspended the Chief Executive Officer of the Public Procurement Authority (PPA), A.B Adjei, over allegations of corruption and conflict of interest.
A statement from the Presidency said the President has referred the allegations involving conflict of interest to the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) and those relating to potential acts of corruption to the Office of Special Prosecutor “for their prompt action.”
The corruption claims came in an investigative documentary conducted by former Multimedia Journalist, Manasseh Azure Awuni, titled “Contracts for Sale”.
Meanwhile, the Chairperson of the Board of the PPA has been tasked “to ensure that Mr AB Adjei hands over his office expeditiously to Mr. Frank Mante, the Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the PPA.”
In the documentary, Mr. Boateng was said to have established his own company, Talent Discovery Limited incorporated, in June 2017 which won some government contracts through restrictive tendering.
The company was in turn selling the contracts to individuals as revealed by Manasseh Azure Awuni’s sting operations.
From the documentary, Talent Discovery Limited was ready to sell a contract worth GHc22.3 million to a non-existent entity.
Before this investigation, Mr. Adjei was well regarded in the procurement space.
When PPA was set up in 2005, he was the first CEO and was reappointed in 2017 when the Akufo-Addo administration came to power.
In November 2018, he was elected as an Executive Member of the African Public Procurement Network.
The PPA was established by the Public Procurement Act, 2003 (Act 663) as a regulatory body responsible for the effective implementation of the Public Procurement Law in Ghana.
The Authority is mandated to ensure fairness, transparency and non-discrimination in public procurement in order to promote a competitive local industry.
