The Commissioner General of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), Rev. Amishaddai Owusu-Amoah, will be sued over his age and continued stay in office.
The threat to the GRA boss to face the music the legal way was issued by the minority Member of Parliament for South Dayi, Rockson-Nelson Dafeamekpor.
According to him, the NDC in parliament is enraged over the continued stay in office of Amishaddai, though he is over 60 years old, and worse “without a contract extension” from the Ministry of Finance.
The NDC MP argued that the GRA boss ought not to be in office, considering that he had no document backing him.
“The collusion and the cronyism and politics are what are eating our system away. For this matter, if it is not politics, in which country will this happen? And he himself too; it doesn’t bother him to prompt that you must regularise my stay? … People [like Rev. Owusu-Amoah] don’t care any longer, but a day is coming when they will care,” Rockson Nelson Dafeamekpor said in an interview with Okay FM.
He is citing Rev. Owusu-Amoah for benefiting from unearned salaries, which is a legal violation, an irregularities the Auditor General identifies every year.
At a sitting of the Public Accounts Committee recently, Rev. Owusu-Amoah confirmed that he was beyond sixty years old and had been asked by the Finance Minister to stay on with a written contract.
In the view of Mr. Dafeamekpor, the government should have taken immediate steps after the Public Accounts Committee hearing to regularise Rev. Owusu-Amoah’s stay at the GRA.
During his session at the Public Accounts Committee on January 29, 2024 the Commissioner General of the GRA, Rev. Dr. Ammishaddai Owusu-Amoah, stirred up controversy by refusing to disclose his age.
The drama unfolded when committee member and MP for Ningo-Prampram, Samuel Nettey George, probed the Commissioner General about his age, a query met with resistance.
Deputy Minister of Finance, Abena Osei-Asare, who accompanied the GRA boss, objected to the question, deeming it personal, and argued that it should be ruled out.
However, Committee Chairman James Klutse Avedzi overruled the objection, asserting that the Commissioner General, being a public officer, should disclose his age.
In his defence, Sam George argued that the public has a vested interest in the age of the Commissioner General.
He referenced a statement made by Finance Minister Ken Ofori Atta during last year’s Budget reading, wherein it was emphasised that individuals reaching retirement age would not be granted contractual extensions unless their expertise was deemed scarce.
The Commissioner General’s refusal to divulge his age or retirement date added a layer of intrigue to the proceedings, prompting a temporary adjournment of the Public Accounts Committee sitting.
Despite the committee’s efforts, attempts to extract this information from Dr. Amishaddai proved futile, leaving many with raised eyebrows.
