Director General of the State Interests and Governance Authority (SIGA), Stephen Asamoah Boateng, says there has been a significant turn around of State owned Enterprises since President Nana Akufo-Addo created the Authority to supervise their activities.
According to him, SIGA as an entity has, together with the various boards and Chief Executive Officers of state owned businesses, worked to eliminate the pattern of debts that were being accumulated from losses.
Speaking on PM Express on Joy TV, Mr Boateng said majority of government businesses are now making profits, an achievement he attributed to the monitoring and evaluation systems that SIGA has implemented to track the progress of the institutions.
“One reason for the growth of SOEs is the performance contract system that we have built into SIGA which has increased monitoring and evaluation. What we do is we move people on the ground to ask for data. We also ask the companies to feed in the systems we want them to report on so we can do the analysis,” he said.
He hinted that plans are far advanced to make all these processes digital which will make it easier and faster to monitor the progress of SOEs.
Mr Boateng explained further that the other factors that have contributed to the successes of SOEs are the culture of accountability and respect for norms that President Akufo-Addo has built into his appointees.
“The second thing I would say has been a factor in the turn around of SOEs is the culture of accountability and respect for norms that President Akufo-Addo has built into us. So if you do not respect the norms, you will fall foul.
“The last bit is the introduction of corporate governance which has seen boards and the CEOs working together amicably”, he said.
The Director General disclosed that the Authority will soon make public a report which details the financial records of all SOEs since the creation of SIGA.