The Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, has asked the State Interests and Governance Authority (SIGA), to sanction managers of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) who fail to operate in line with laid down procedures to churn out profits.
According to him, this will help address issues of under-performance of state institutions and make them profitable.
This comes on the back of a performance review for state enterprises in 2019.
SIGA replaced the State Enterprises Commission (SEC), which had a supervisory role over state enterprises or institutions where the state had some interest.
Speaking at a 2020 performance contract signing ceremony with key managers of SOEs, Dr. Bawumia emphasized the need to change the seeming opaque operations of state companies which often led to the payment of huge debts by successive governments.
“We have noted with gratitude the sacrifice and good work some of you are doing. We also noted during the 2020 performance contract negotiations some fiscal indiscipline of some of the entities. SIGA has been directed to invoke the necessary articles in the law.”
“How can a State Entity whose core function is to buy and sell a commodity that has a ready market and earn a commission, run into debts of hundreds of millions of Ghana cedis? Either someone doesn’t care or that we run these State Entities with private agendas,” the Vice President said.
SIGA was established in 2019 by an Act of Parliament to put state-owned enterprises and joint venture corporations on the path of profit-making.
Among other things, the Authority which took over the role of the then State Enterprises Commission works to increase profitability within the framework of government policy.
It also exists to introduce effective measures that promote the socio-economic growth of the country, including in particular, agriculture, industry and services in accordance with their core mandates.
CBN
