The Executive Officer of the Salt and Light Ministries and former Chief Executive of the Ghana Chamber of Mines, Dr. Joyce Aryee has called on government to publish the details of the private sponsors for the pilgrimage to Israel.
Despite government's efforts dissociate itself from being named as the major sponsor for the now infamous 'Isreal pilgrimage' for some of the nation's Christian leaders, several media reports continue to accuse it of misappropriating state funds. Overseer of Action Faith Chapel International, Archbishop Duncan Williams has told Citi News that the timing of the trip is misplaced.
Speaking in an interview with citifmonline.com, Dr Joyce Aryee said though it was not wrong for the government to facilitate the trip, it is equally important, for the sake of transparency, for the identities of the sponsors to be revealed.
�In this era of integrity and transparency, I cannot pay a certain sum of money into even my personal account without raising eyebrows. So even if it�s ten sponsors and each of them pays $60,000 that should be made public.
Remember we deal with a lot with development partners; you don�t want the wrong questions being asked. If you have people in this country who actually wheeled $60,0000. It may be a small sum of money but not for some people. And so I think that for transparency and integrity sake, they should come out�.
Dr Aryee however held the view that though �facilitating a pilgrimage is in the right direction because that is what governments do... I do not think that government should pay for the trip�.
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