FACT-CHECK: How much funding has gov’t provided the Office of the Special Prosecutor over the years?
Claim: 3 claims about Ghana’s CPI score and funding of OSP to fight corruption
Source: Prof. Enoch Opoku Antwi/ TV3
Verdict:1 UNDERSTATED & 2 INACCURATE
Researched by Gifty Tracy Aminu
A governance and leadership expert, Prof. Enoch Opoku Antwi, speaking on TV3’s The Key Points programme, a weekend political talk show, on July 8, 2023, has made some claims about Ghana’s effort to fight corruption over the last few years.
Prof. Antwi said the prevalence of corruption in Ghana has continued to impact our Corruption Perception Index score over the years while highlighting how much the country spends on resourcing the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) to fight the menace.
“The Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) had 150 cases in front of him, and we’ve spent almost GH¢500 million on the OSP office,” he said (2hr:18mins:40sec – 2hr:18mins:56sec).
“…According to Transparency International, if you hit 50 and above, you are not corrupt. Mahama was able to get to 49 (Member of Parliament for Tamale Central, Murtala Mohammed, interjected that it was 47), and he ended at 43. But has been 43 from New Patriotic Party (NPP) time till now,” he added (2hr:44mins:55sec 2hr:47mins:13sec).
This fact-check report will seek to verify the accuracy of three claims:
Whether the government has spent GH¢500 million on the OSP?
If a country hits 50 and above on the CPI, does that mean it is not corrupt?
Whether Ghana recorded a score of 49 and 43 under the former government?
Claim 1
The government has spent GH¢500 million on the OSP
Fact-Check
To fact-check this claim, GhanaFact will rely on financial reports from the Ministry of Finance focusing on the Office of the Special Prosecutor.
On pages 7 and 8 of the report, under the sub-heading “Expenditure Trends for the Medium-Term,” lies the amount allocated and approve for the operational activities of the OSP.
“To enable the Office of the Special Prosecutor to carry out its planned activities over the medium-term, total amounts of GH¢3,791,214.00, GH¢180,160,225.00 and GH¢138,146,482.00 were appropriated under the various Economic Classification for 2018, 2019 and 2020 financial years respectively with funding sources being GOG [Government of Ghana].”
Also, the report highlighted that in 2021, “the Office has been allocated a total budget of GH¢124,103,085 out of which GH¢43,473,043, GH¢50,630,042 and GH¢30,000,000 are for compensation of employees, Good and Services and Capital Expenditure respectively.”
Under the expenditure trends for the medium-term in the “Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) for 2023-2026 report,” the Office of the Special Prosecutor was initially allocated GH¢ 170,504,000.00 in 2022 but was later reviewed to a total budget of GH¢138,852,800.00.
Meanwhile, the Finance Ministry budgeted GH¢129,549,380.00 for the 2023 financial operations for the Office of the Special Prosecutors.
The table below shows the amounts allocated to the office of the Special Prosecutor from 2018 to 2023, according to reports by the Ministry of Finance.
As of November 2021, the Office of the Special Prosecutor’s actual expenditure stood at GH¢ 58,461,165.53 despite the total allocation for the year being GH¢ 124,103,085.00 (here).
The claim is UNDERSTATED per available public records.
Claim 2
If you hit 50 and above on the CPI, you are not corrupt
Fact-Check
The Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) is the most widely used global corruption ranking in the world. It measures how corrupt each country’s public sector is perceived to be, according to experts and businesspeople.
A country’s score is the perceived level of public sector corruption on a scale of 0-100, where 0 means highly corrupt and 100 means very clean.
“If you score 50 it means you have been able to score half of the total mark. But generally, the higher you score the better you are as a country relative to corruption,” a former Executive Director of Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII), a local chapter of Transparency International, Vitus Azeem explained when contacted by GhanaFact.
“Small fluctuations or changes in a country’s CPI score are not usually significant, which is why every year in the full table of results , we mark all those countries that have undergone a “statistically significant” change,” Transparency International has stated on its website.
Verdict
The claim is INACCURATE.
Claim 3
The former government recorded a CPI score of 49 and 43 within 4 years
Fact-Check
GhanaFact will use the Corruption Perception Index report published by Transparency International from 2013 to 2022 (latest) to verify the claim.
The CPI scores of countries are a combination of at least 3 data sources drawn from 13 different corruption surveys and assessments. These data sources are collected by a variety of reputable institutions, including the World Bank and the World Economic Forum.
Analysing the report from Transparency International, it is inaccurate to suggest that former President John Dramani Mahama’s highest score in the Corruption Perception Index is 49, and it will be an understatement to say it was 47 as indicated by the MP for Tamale Central.
Also, it is inaccurate to suggest the governing Party (NPP) led by President Akufo Addo has maintained the 43 scores since it came into power.
Source: Transparency International
When GhanaFact contacted Prof. Enoch Opoku Antwi about the findings of this report, he acknowledged that there might have been some omissions during his submission. “You can go ahead and publish. I don’t mind,” he added.
