Mr. Fred Aryeetey, the Chief Executive Officer of the Institute of Directors-Ghana (IoD Ghana), has commended the State Interest and Governance Authority (SIGA) for developing a draft Code of Good Corporate Governance for State-Owned Enterprises.
He said good corporate governance was the way to go and praised SIGA for the foresight towards ensuring the efficiency and effectiveness of state-owned enterprises.
Mr Aryeetey said this in an interview with the Ghana News Agency on Wednesday.
SIGA, in consultation with relevant stakeholders, has developed a draft “Good Corporate Governance Code” for State Owned Enterprises.
“I have looked at the draft document and I think it is thorough, comprehensive and detailed,” he said.
Mr Aryeetey said while it was commendable to have the Code, it was important for state owned enterprises to accept it as the way of life of the organisations towards the realisation of desired results.
He said, “As a country, we should be working towards one Code of Corporate Governance for the whole country.”
Mr Stephen Asamoah Boateng, the Director-General of SIGA, at a stakeholder engagement on the draft code, said inadequate governance frameworks and procedures were critical contributors to many specified entities’ poor financial performance in Ghana, hence the initiative.
He said State Agencies were governed by a complicated web of leaderships involving Parliament, Ministries, Regulatory Commissions, Boards, and Managing Directors or Chief Executives, all of whom had various reporting responsibilities.
“This has muddled the division of responsibilities and accountability for performance, especially between the Board and Management. In some cases, Chief Executive Officers and Board appointments are made based on political considerations rather than merit, contributing to the ineffectiveness of some Boards,” he noted.
He said, “We can all agree that if we want to give the public something to grin about, we cannot run State-Owned Enterprises the way we used to. If Specified Entities continue to underperform, we will not be deserving of our positions and compensation”.
The Director-General said SIGA was required by Section 4 (d) of its Act (Act 990) to develop a code of corporate governance to serve as a framework for Specified Entities’ actions and performance.
