Monrovia – Cllr. James Verdier, lead fighter of corruption in Liberia, stands accused by some of his former employees of acts of corruption.
Report by Lennart Dodoo, [email protected]
At least five persons, who were once in the employ of the Liberia Anti-Corruption Commission (LACC), have raised red flag over “integrity issues and/or misapplication of salaries of employees.”
But the LACC Chairman has refuted claims and urged the disenchanted former employees comprising the former Chief of Investigation, D. Blamo Koffa; former Chief of Operations, Roosevelt R. Doe; former Internal Auditor, Atty. Wonderr K. Freeman; Former Program Manager, Enforcement Division, Aaron H. Aboah and former Executive Director, Daniel B. Tipayson.
The Lowdown
The former staffs of the LACC in a complaint to the Senate Committee on Autonomous Commissions and Agencies said in 2013, they noticed that taxes were being deducted from their salaries progressively (about 25%) instead of just 10%.
Upon realization, a request through the office of Cllr. Verdier, being the Executive Chairman of the Commission, for a return of the surplus taxation to the affected employees.
This request for reimbursement was approved by the then Deputy Minister for Revenue, Dr. James Kollie to be paid in three instalments for periods covering 2009 to 2014.
The Conflict
The complaint to the Senate, a copy of which FrontPageAfrica has obtained revealed that Cllr. Verdier made full payments of the first instalment to the employees – both those still in the employ of the LACC and those who had left. However, there were alleged discrepancies in manner in which the second payment was disbursed.
“We do acknowledge the kind gesture exhibited by Cllr. Verdier, except that when the second installment was released to the LACC, Cllr. Verdier, without consent of the affected employees, unilaterally deducted US$30,000 under the pretense he/and or the administration of the LACC were going to procure a power generator”.
“We wish to flag here that the wonderful generator was never purchased. This is an integrity issue and/or misapplication of salaries to say he wanted to procure a power generator”. We plead with your committee to compel Cllr. Verdier to restitute this amount for the benefit of the affected employees,” the complainants noted.
Some of the affected employees who were contacted by FrontPageAfrica said the payment was selectively done during the disbursement of the second installment. Only those who were still in the employ of the LACC, without providing any explanations as to what happened to the monies of those who had left the Commission.
Raising the voucher for the third instalment was a hullaballoo between the former executive director, who left the entity in pursuit of a political seat in March 2017, and the Chairman of LACC.
According to Mr. Tipayson, he on several occasions engaged Cllr. Verdier to sign the voucher for the payment of the last instalment but was at one point told by the LACC Chairman that “signing a voucher when the government is in a tight financial condition would question my integrity”.
However, Cllr. Verdier signed the voucher upon the resignation of Mr. Tipayson. His excuse when questioned was; “I said I was not signing a voucher requesting reimbursement of taxes but I am sure a staff of the LACC Finance Section must have sneaked the identical voucher amongst the vouchers I signed.”
The five signatories of the complaint to the Senate Committee alleged that Cllr. Verdier, upon receiving the disbursement of the third instalment from the Ministry of Finance deleted names of former employees and disbursed very minimum amounts to the staffs still in the employ of the Commission and awarded unto Commissioners special allowances that were not part of the 2016/2017 fiscal budget.
“This is an integrity issue for diverting salaries to special allowances that were not part of the 2016/2017 fiscal budget but were disbursed to the five commissioners in the last quarter (April-June 2016/2017) of the year.”
“We humbly request your intervention for the LACC to restitute our fair share of the returned money released to the commission by the MFDP without pre-condition,” the communication to the Senate Committee requested.
Verdier: Vicious Allegation
Speaking to FrontPage Africa on the allegations, the LACC Chairman said it was the LACC internal auditors that discovered the discrepancy in the taxation and not the aggrieved employees.
“They had no inclination; they were happily paying their tax deduction. They didn’t even complain. It was through investigation that it was discovered by one internal auditor who was rehired. One of the persons, who is aggrieved or claim to be aggrieved, had been internal auditor when he was here and he didn’t even discover it,” Verdier said.
According to Cllr. Verdier, the LACC being an institution that believes in seeking employees’ interests confronted the Ministry of Finance which agreed to remit the excess tax to the employees of the LACC.
Remittance Not from Finance Ministry
Verdier said the Ministry of Finance disbursed the remittance of the over taxation from LACC’s budget that were overturned to the Ministry of Finance due to their inability to exhaust their programs during the Ebola period.
Verdier: “The remittances were made directly from the Ministry of Finance; the remittances were made based on surplus of money that had left from the LACC – monies that were apportioned and budgeted for LACC that the LACC did not use in that year.
In that year we made a special request to the Ministry of Finance to actually augment LACC’s approved budget because of our activities. Because of Ebola we could not expend all that money so we requested Ministry of Finance to instead of sending that money back to them, we said ‘why don’t you use that money and pay our staff who you over taxed?’”
He said it was based on that request that the Ministry of Finance made the payment to the LACC, while admitting that the anti-graft commission erred by paying all employees – both current and those who were no longer in the employ of the Commission.
The LACC Chairman told FrontPage Africa that upon noticing it was an error on their part, the Board of Commissioners took a decision to pay only those still in the employ of the LACC when the second instalment was disbursed by the Finance Ministry.
The Generator Was Purchased, But…
Cllr. Verdier said while the LACC was going through the period of receiving reimbursements from the Ministry of Finance, the Commission was also going through some constraints and its generator was down – making work at the Commission difficult, he said.
“We were going through a crisis and government didn’t have money, so the BOC met and said ‘since this money has been given to us and there is still a possibility of remitting, why don’t we use portion of this money and buy a generator… and remit the balance to the staff…’”
According to him, contrary to claims that the decision was unilaterally taken, a general staff meeting was called and the decision was discussed with the staff and they all consented to the decision.
“We didn’t call only the employees concerned, we called a general staff meeting and told that I – my conscience will not serve me right that we’re going through a crisis, we don’t have generator, we don’t have power, we don’t have stationery, but we take money and distribute to employees as remittances that government owed them for two, three years. They agreed, even if they didn’t agree, that was a policy decision taken by the BOC,” Cllr. Verdier told FrontPage Africa.
Not Responsible for Former Employees
Verdier said the LACC could not disburse monies to former employees because the commission could not seek the interest of individuals who are no longer in the employ of the commission.
“We wrote the former employees and said since you have this claim and they are legitimate but as LACC, we’re not assuming the responsibility to make claims on your behalf because you’re former employees.”
“Our responsibility is with people who are employed with us. So these claims that you have, make them directly to Ministry of Finance so that they’ll pay you these different remittances that they have,” he said.
Verdier: Special Allowances Genuine
The LACC Chairman debunked the allegation that the third remittance paid by the Finance Ministry was shared among commissioners of the LACC as special allowance.
He said, while it is true that the Ministry of Finance allocated an amount in the last quarter of the FY 2016/2017, it was based on the request of the LACC since other autonomous commissions and agencies were benefitting same.
He said the special allowance to the commissioners was not paid from remittance for employees, rather based on a request to the Ministry of Finance.
Go To Court
Verdier acknowledged the invitation from the Senate Committee but said it would be more appropriate for the complainants to go to court.
Already, some of the aggrieved former employees are threatening to take the LACC to court for its failure to remit their money.