Former Member of Parliament for Pru East, Dr. Kwabena Donkor, has issued a forceful call for an urgent and comprehensive payroll audit of the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) and other state-owned enterprises.
Dr. Donkor says the issues surrounding the operations of COCOBOD are a symbol of the deeper corporate governance failures plaguing Ghana’s public sector.
This call for reforms follows the recent revelation by the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of COCOBOD, Dr. Randy Abbey, that the state institution currently employs 10,000 people with a monthly wage bill amounting to a whopping $12 million.
In an exclusive interview with The High Street Journal, Dr. Donkor viewed the situation an offshoot of systemic inefficiencies due to a breakdown of corporate governance principles.
The mining, energy, and corporate governance consultant fears COCOBOD is possibly bedeviled with ghost names and irresponsible employment practices within state-run institutions.
He is therefore calling on the government to act decisively to safeguard public funds and restore accountability.
The Bloated Payroll and Ghost Names Syndrome
The Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), he noted, is emblematic of the widespread payroll mismanagement in the state sector. With monthly salary obligations exceeding $12 million, Dr. Donkor questioned the legitimacy of the employee numbers reported by COCOBOD.
“We will have to find out whether that number actually exists or if they are just number on the books so there has to be a headcount,” he indicated.
The problem extends far beyond COCOBOD. Across several public enterprises, retirees, deceased persons, and staff who have abandoned their posts remain on payrolls due to weak internal controls and lack of proper audit systems.
The Call for Vigorous Audit, Automation, Accountability
Dr. Donkor is calling for a vigorous and independent staff audit, including a physical headcount across all state-owned enterprises, to establish the actual number of employees.
He believes this should be the first step in a broader effort to clean the public payroll system.
Dr Donkor also pushed for the automation of payroll management, integrated with national identification and death registries, to prevent fraudulent salary payments.
“A number of organisations, people retire, they are still on payroll, their names will not be expunged, people desert posts, and they still have their names on payroll. People depart from this earth, and they still have their names on payroll, among others. And therefore, there is a need for a vigorous staff audit, headcount, as a starting point,” he added.
He continued, “In addition to the headcount, there should be mechanisms of blocking salaries when people desert posts, of immediately blocking salaries when people resign, of blocking salaries when people die.”
No Employment Without Business Case
Drawing on his experience as former Chair of the Committee on Public Administration and State Interests of Parliament , Dr. Donkor recounted a troubling instance where a state enterprise reported doubling its staff numbers as an achievement. This was not to meet demand or enhance productivity but simply as an achievement.
He insists Public Enterprises are not Youth Employment Agency (YEA) where the core mandate is the creation of employment.
To him every employment made by a state enterprise must financially and operationally justified.
“They were making losses. So I remember remarking that they were not YEA. YEA is the only statutory organisation allowed to create employment for employment’s sake. You see, there has to be a business case for employment, especially for commercial entities. You don’t employ for employment’s sake,” he cautioned.
COCOBOD’s Poor Governance: A Testament of Board Failure
Beyond payroll, Dr. Donkor criticized COCOBOD’s board for failing in its oversight role, particularly in the questionable forward sales strategy that denied Ghana windfall gains from the global surge in cocoa prices.
Traditionally, COCOBOD was expected to forward-sell only 40% of expected output and sell the remaining 60% on the spot market to benefit from price volatility. However, the former administration reportedly oversold future cocoa stock, locking Ghana into low prices before the commodity price boom.
“The cocoa board issue is pathetic. It is pathetic because there was supposed to be a board. And what did the board do? COCOBOD again, for example, did oversell the cocoa they were expecting. And this was a forward sale. And so Ghana did not benefit much from the rise in world cocoa price because we had forward sold all our cocoa, even in excess,” he lamented.
Corporate Governance Across Public Enterprises A Necessity
The issues plaguing COCOBOD, according to Dr. Donkor, are just the tip of the iceberg. He warned that the entire state-owned enterprise sector suffers from weak corporate governance, lack of accountability, and misplaced priorities.
Dr. Donkor insists that fixing these problems requires political will, public accountability, and policy reforms anchored in transparency. He called on civil society and the media to join the fight against ghost names, wasteful employment, and boardroom negligence.
To start with, he calls for a payroll audit and the strengthening of the oversight role of all boards of state enterprises.
