'Public Servants unaware of housing loan scheme'

Page 34, Aug 21, 2009
Story: Emmanuel Adu-Gyamerah
DESPITE the desire of public and civil servants to have decent accommodation after their retirement, most of them are unaware of a Public Servants Housing Loans Scheme that has been Iin existence since 1975.
A performance audit report of the Auditor-General which was considered by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament during its public sitting last Wednesday showed that 73 per cent of public servants interviewed across the country were not aware of the loan scheme.
That is because managers of the scheme neither advertise nor inform staff of the ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) about its activities.
The acting Executive Secretary, Mr Solomon Bonney, and the Head of Finance of the scheme, Mr Stanley Kumah, appeared before the committee to answer qustions on the scheme.
The two drew a lot of laughter throughout the sitting as they found it difficult to convince members of the committee with their explanation as to why most civil servants did not know about the existence of the scheme.
Giving explanations about why the scheme was unknown, Mr Bonney said that the scheme would come under pressure from would-be beneficiaries if civil servants knew more about it, and that the scheme would not be able to satisfy applicants.
However, members of the committee disagreed and suggested that the choice to access the loans should be left to individual public servants and should not be predetermined by the scheme managers.
Almost all members of the committee who quizzed officials of the scheme, who were led by the Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, Mr Albert Bongo, expressed surprise about the existence of the scheme.
Disappointed by the performance of the scheme since its establishment, they suggested that the scheme should be scrapped since it had not been able to live up to expectation.
But Mr Kumah explained that it would be possible for the scheme to perform better if the government should provide the much needed capital.
He said despite its shortcomings, 3,939 public servants benefited from the scheme between 1975 and 2005.
A total of ¢22, 984,866,086 had been disbursed so far. Out of the amount, ¢18,068,292,560 had been recovered from the beneficiaries.
The chairman of the PAC, Mr Albert Kan-Dapaah, said he was amazed about the idea behind the establishment of the scheme more than 30 years ago, and expressed his disappointment about how the scheme had been managed over the years.
He suggested to the sector ministry to look at the possibility of re-organising the scheme to enable it to achieve its intended purpose.
For his part, Mr Abongo gave the assurance that the board of the scheme would be reconstituted, adding that the recommendation that would be made by Parliament would also be implemented to ensure the re-organisation of the scheme.