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Minister for Parliamentary Affairs and Member of Parliament for Suame, Hon. Osei Kyei Mensah-Bonsu, strongly believes government needs to check the operations of the Foreign Affairs Ministry.

Speaking on Okay FM’s 'Ade Akye Abia' programme, Hon Kyei Mensah Bonsu, stressed that the Foreign Affairs Ministry is engaged in so many activities in missions abroad and it is incumbent on government to ensure that their operations result in value for money for the state.

"Some where last year, a property in Nigeria which belonged to the Foreign Affairs Ministry and valued seven million (7 million gh) was valued less by some officials and sold for less than one million (1 million).
 
"You see when these things happen then government will need to check the operations of the Foreign Affairs ministry and ensure that some of these things are prevented for us to get value for money," he added.

Condemning what happened at the foyer of Parliament House on Monday, Hon Kyei Mensah-Bonsu, who is also the Majority Leader, pointed out that the minority had no right to invade the minister’s privacy.

Hot Verbal Exchanges

A nasty drama was witnessed in Parliament on Monday when the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, Shirley Ayorkor Botchway, engaged the ranking member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of Parliament, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa in a heated verbal exchange.

The wild confrontation ended with trading of insults at each other over a purported property which the ministry was seeking to buy to serve as a chancellery for Ghana's mission in Norway.

According to the Minister, Hon Okudzeto Ablakwa had claimed her outfit was inflating the cost of the 100-year-old building by asserting the Ministry quoted $12.1million for the building instead of $3.5million.

Mr Ablakwa, who is the Minority Spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, revealed the Minority’s investigation uncovered that $16.5million presented to the Foreign Affairs Committee of Parliament as the budget for the new mission in Oslo, the Chancery and the Ambassador’s residence is “outrageously high.”

“It is outlandishly inflated,” Mr Ablakwa said during approval of the budget estimate for the ministry on Monday.

The building, he said was bought in 2014 for NOK 25.2million which is equivalent to $2.9million and per a Norwegian newspaper, in 2017, the property was sold to an unknown buyer for NOK31million which is equivalent to $3.5million.

“Then our Foreign Ministry is buying this at NOK105million which is equivalent to $12.1million. A property that was sold for only $3.5million last year, August last year. What’s going on? Where is the due diligence? Who did the evaluation report?” he said stating the Norwegian press are describing the entire transaction as ‘unethical’.