The Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) has opened a file into a double-salary scandal involving a former director of finance at the Simon Diedong Dombo University of Business and Integrated Development Studies (SDD-UBIDS), Abdulai Suglo.
Media Without Borders learns the OSP has invited three officials of the university so far for questioning.
Suglo drew salaries and allowances from SDD-UBIDS and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) at the same time for 19 months between June 2020 and December 2021, amounting to Gh¢115,516.62.
External auditors from the Ghana Audit Service (GAS) discovered the scandal while reviewing the financial statements of SDD-UBIDS in 2023.
It was subsequently captured on page 245 of the 2023 Report of the Auditor-General that the audit service asked Suglo to pay the Gh¢115,516.62 into the Auditor-General’s Recoveries Account number 1018331470015 at Bank of Ghana.
Page 245 of the report further revealed that Suglo proposed to pay the money back in a monthly instalment of Gh¢6,417.59 over a period of 18 months.
On Friday, 22 September 2023, the SDD-UBIDS’s vice-chancellor at the time, Prof. Philip Duku Osei, wrote to Suglo, notifying him that the university’s audit committee had requested that he (Suglo) repay the double salary and allowances as directed by the auditor-general.
Suglo received the letter. But he did not refund the money. He only wrote a letter to the audit committee on Friday, 23 February 2024, stating that he preferred the university’s governing council handle the audit findings on the double-salary matter.
When Suglo appeared before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) in Parliament on Friday, 16 August 2024, he admitted during a televised sitting that he received double salary from the two public universities. But he said he did so because SDD-UBIDS failed to honour some terms and conditions of employment to which senior members of the university, including him, were entitled.
He also described as false the claim made in the Auditor-General’s report that he proposed to refund the double salary in a monthly instalment of Gh¢6,417.59 over a period of 18 months.
The committee, chaired by James Klutse Avedzi, affirmed that it was unlawful for any employee in Ghana to draw double salary from the consolidated fund or the public purse and said under no circumstances should any worker do so.
The committee, therefore, concluded that Suglo’s action was unacceptable and directed him to refund to the state only the basic salary he drew from SDD-UBIDS throughout the 19-month period.
The committee gave him one month to comply with the directive. Suglo did not refund the money within the stipulated one month. Sources suspect the university’s governing council is backing him and believe it is the reason he is not complying with the directive.
Letter of refund notice
But Media Without Borders has sighted a letter he purportedly wrote recently to the SDD-UBIDS’ current vice-chancellor, Prof. Emmanuel Kanchebe Derbile, claiming he had deposited the money into the SDD-UBIDS’ “account number 0011130001815 at the GCB Bank, Wa Branch.”
The letter, dated 4th April 2025, emerged 10 days after Media Without Borders had told the public about the scandal in a report published on Tuesday, 25 March 2025, and 7 days after the OSP started inviting SDD-UBIDS officials to Accra for questioning.
Sources at the university say there are reasons to doubt that he has refunded the money. The first reason is that he did not deposit the money into the required Auditor-General’s Recoveries Account number 1018331470015 at Bank of Ghana where the said payment can be independently verified.
Secondly, the university’s account number, into which he deposited the money according to that letter, is controlled by a governing council that is suspected to be backing him and, as such, the council may dishonestly testify that he has paid the money into the university’s account.
The third reason is that there is no bank receipt or pay-in slip attached to the letter and there is no mention of any of these documents in the letter as evidence that a refund transaction has taken place.
Lastly, the signature appended to that letter is slightly different from the signature associated with Suglo in other official documents he is known to have signed. The perceived slight dissimilarities or variations in the signatures could mean there is no genuine claim or affirmation from him that the money has been refunded.
Suglo did not respond when this author asked him if he had refunded the money. The sources want the OSP to demand evidence of payment from him and thoroughly probe any claims the university’s authorities or any banks make in his defence with regard to the refund.
“The most ideal thing is for the OSP to ensure he pays the money back through the Auditor-General’s Recoveries Account as originally directed,” said one of the sources.
“That is the only way the public can be sure that the money has been paid back. Even if he pays the money into the university’s account, the university might return the money to him without anyone else knowing about it.”
Background
Suglo once served as a senior accountant at KNUST. While he was at KNUST, he took a sabbatical leave to take up a new job as an interim director of finance at SDD-UBIDS.
A sabbatical leave, also known as a sabbatical, is a period away from work granted to an employee for a period longer than a normal leave to invest the time in some personal passions and priorities.
Although he was scheduled to start his sabbatical leave from KNUST on 10th August 2020 and end it on 9th August 2021, he started working at SDD-UBIDS in June, 2020.
And before he arrived in Wa from Kumasi, a letter signed by a KNUST assistant registrar, Yvonne Baiden, forewarned him against drawing double salary.
The letter partly read:
The condition of service regarding sabbatical leave is that the university should continue to pay your basic salary.
However, based on the external auditors’ recommendation, an employee cannot draw double salary from the consolidated fund.
In view of this, you can either draw your basic salary from the university or the institution you are serving during the sabbatical leave, but not both.
The following year (2021), Suglo was made a substantive director of finance by the governing council of the SDD-UBIDS.
After his sabbatical leave ended in 2021, he was granted a one-year extension by KNUST upon request. And when the extension ran out, he remained at SDD-UBIDS by applying to KNUST for a secondment (a temporary transfer) and subsequently for a leave of absence.
While he was working at SDD-UBIDS, he was drawing salaries and allowances from both KNUST and SDD-UBIDS at the same time. Months after the external auditors discovered the double-salary scandal, he resigned from SDD-UBIDS.
He explained in his resignation letter, dated 1st August 2024, that his leave of absence from KNUST had ended and the university had rejected his extension request. But he said he was prepared to remain at SDD-UBIDS, and he did remain, until 6th January 2025, to “ensure a smooth transition.”
He exited SDD-UBIDS in January, 2025, as he had indicated in his resignation letter in August, 2024.
Media Without Borders learns the KNUST management moved him to the university’s remote campus at Obuasi, Ashanti Region, upon his return from the leave of absence.
Source: Edward Adeti/Media Without Borders/mwbonline.org/Ghana
