Public Accounts Committee leaders are demanding answers as the GETFund Administrator remains absent from hearings regarding long-stalled school infrastructure projects.
The Chairperson of the Public Accounts Committee, Abena Osei Asare, has publicly slammed the Administrator of the Ghana Education Trust Fund, Paul Adjei, for his recurring failure to appear before the committee.. This ongoing friction centers on the persistent issue of abandoned school projects that continue to plague the education sector despite years of audit warnings.
At the heart of the frustration is the inability of the committee to get direct answers on why critical infrastructure remains incomplete.. During the recent public hearings, the Chairperson made it clear that the Administrator’s absence is a significant roadblock to resolving the discrepancies flagged in the 2024 Auditor General’s report.. With some of these construction sites sitting idle for over two decades, the committee is losing patience with the lack of accountability from the leadership tasked with managing these critical funds.
Decades of Stalled Infrastructure
The scale of the problem is difficult to ignore.. According to the 2024 Auditor General’s report, 16 distinct projects across nine different institutions have faced either total abandonment or extreme delays.. Some of these structures, intended to serve students and faculty, have been left to weather the elements for as long as 28 years.. Schools like Adanwomoase Senior High, which has dealt with unfinished dormitories for over a decade, and Atoa Senior High, where a home economics block has been a skeleton of a building for 27 years, represent the human cost of these systemic failures.
Beyond the raw numbers, the situation represents a massive waste of taxpayer money and a direct impact on the quality of education.. When a dining hall at Beposo Senior High or a massive three-storey classroom block at KNUST Senior High remains incomplete for years, it is the students who suffer most.. The physical shells of these buildings serve as daily reminders of administrative oversight that has failed to prioritize the completion of essential learning environments.
The Accountability Gap
Misryoum investigations into this matter suggest that the refusal of high-ranking officials to engage with the Public Accounts Committee is part of a broader pattern of departmental disconnect.. When an administrator avoids public scrutiny, it creates a vacuum where responsibility for budget mismanagement cannot be assigned.. If the individuals in charge of the purse strings do not answer for the delays, the cycle of contractors abandoning sites and funds vanishing into thin air will likely continue indefinitely.
Looking ahead, the committee’s insistence on a face-to-face meeting is about more than just filling out audit forms; it is about establishing a precedent of oversight.. Without a clear directive on how to prioritize these stalled projects, many of these half-finished structures will inevitably become liabilities rather than assets.. The public now watches to see if the GETFund leadership will finally step up to answer for these long-standing irregularities.