<<Print>>

Government has engaged the services of the providers of the 'Veryfy platform', a software a software innovator as part of ongoing reforms to strengthen the performance of the Ghana Youth Employment & Entrepreneurship Development Authority (GYEEDA). GYEEDA thus becomes the first government agency in the world to adopt the Veryfy platform, a first-in-class, integrated, anti-fraud, anti-forgery, and transparency-support software system being pioneered from its office in Accra. The Agency was hit with allegations of fraud and improper award of contract to service providers following a series of investigations by Joy News, compelling the president to institute a committee to probe its activities. The committee in its report, recommended various reforms in the operations of GYEEDA. "The platform shall support GYEEDA�s new national zero tolerance for fraud policy, by making accountability stronger, record-keeping more advanced, ensuring integrity in their operations, and removing all the loopholes on which corruption thrives," National Coordinator of GYEEDA, Kobby Akyeampong has stated. In addition to preventing document forgery, deliberate tampering and misplacement of critical documents, and misrepresentation, it shall also be useful in helping eliminate ghost-names and impersonation through its SmartID module, which enables instant electronic verification of personnel. "Furthermore, chains of correspondence spanning many years into the future are now to be seamlessly tracked, traced, secured and indexed in special databases for pattern analysis to prevent fraud, graft and tender and procurement abuse. According to Kobby Acheampong: "Whilst the Veryfy platform has been deployed across the GYEEDA Organisation through a cloud-computing based platform, it is the ability of the platform to connect with the general public-and enable them to also interact securely with tamper-proof GYEEDA documents- ranging from official correspondence to ID cards that persuaded GYEEDA management to fast-track the implementation of this cutting-edge platform". "It is not only the functionalities and capabilities of the Veryfy platform that are innovative, but the project management and implementation itself has been unique. "GYEEDA is supporting its Veryfy deployment purely from external CSR (corporate social responsibility) resources, and there is therefore no charge to Government, the Consolidated Fund, or the agency. The design of the system for GYEEDA, its actual development, and the current deployment that is being announced were all carried out smoothly within a few months of the new GYEEDA Management coming into office. "No other public IT Project has been delivered with such efficiency in Ghana and this successful launch clearly shows that the capacity exists within the Government to deliver powerful solutions and projects on time and within budget across the public sector. He called on the public to support the effort to use technology, innovation and reform "to build a better youth employment and entrepreneurial program for Ghana". Kobby Acheampong advised the public to visit the GYEEDA Veryfy page Veryfy platform and look out for announcements in due course.