Our Resolve Beyond Morlu is Ultra-Firm, Says Acting AG

2 May 2011

Critics of outgoing Auditor General John Morlu have hilariously contended that he politicized the GAC, an accusation that is hardly defined on factual foundation, though independent analysts think the criticism is largely because of the Commission’s unbending attitude, coupled with the naming and shaming of auditees in published audit reports. This has created a sea of bad blood between the GAC under Morlu and the Sirleaf administration–bad blood that did not get dry until Morlu was whisked off from the Commission. But as the Analyst reports, the workforce left behind by Morlu aren’t showing any inkling of subservience and trepidation as they vow to maintain their sacked boss’ mode of operations.

“If anybody, whether living on Mars, Jupiter or Pluto thinks that John’s leaving of the General Auditing Commission will change the Commission’s mode operation and mortgage its independence and unwavering audit style to the whims and caprices of powerful influences, then you are mistaken. We will maintain John’s modus operandi because we believe in it as the only way of conquering corruption in this country.”

Those were the words of Acting Auditor General Winsley S. Nanka when he spoke Saturday at the farewell program of outgoing Auditor General John Morlu.

In President Sirleaf’s public statement which communicated her hesitancy to re-nominate John Morlu for another four year term, the President confessed that she had harbored disagreement over the outgoing Auditor General’s “modes of operations”, even though she indicated that “Our disagreements over his mode of operation have never negated the fact that he has established a foundation that his successors can build upon in the fight against corruption”.

“We did not always agree with the way Mr. Morlu performed his job, including an indictment that our Government was three times more corrupt than its predecessors, even before he officially commissioned his very first audit,” the President said in the statement which only serve as her official disengagement with the man she had hired in 2007 to fight corruption and waste of public resource.

But as if the President’s strong expression of loath and hate for Morlu and his “mode operation” was not sufficient to put them in their shield, those Morlu is leaving in charge appear defiantly clinched to those modes of operation.

“John has established a foundation that no one–absolutely no one–can undo,” GAC’s Chief Operations Officer yelled on the top of his voice at Saturday’s farewell program organized by the GAC in honor of outgoing Morlu. “We defy anyone to try to do it;” and not even the President can do it.

In a strongly worded statement read on behalf of the GAC staff by Chief Communications Officer Sherman C. Seequeh, the GAC stated: “To us, management and staff of the GAC, the four years was just like a single day in service. So short and so fleeting that it leaves us with greater thirst for the inspiration and esprit de corps which Mr. Morlu provided at the Commission”.

“In our collective and individual lives,” the GAC asserts, “the last four years was full of brainwaves. It was a time of renewal. It was a time of professional rebirth. Mr. Morlu, we shall never forget this period–and the cause–that brought us together yesterday and that is separating us today”.

The statement catalogued the achievements that John Morlu brought to the GAC and the fight against corruption.

“But because you had a revolution to launch; because you wanted to make a radical departure from the past, you fought to get a headquarters that would herald the sanctity and virtuousness of the GAC,” the statement further recounted. “So, in spite of the temptation of taking the GAC headquarters to private buildings and instead of filling the pockets of real estate commercialists, most of whom are notorious for driving the knife of exorbitant rentals deep in the heart of the meager revenue of the Liberian state, you chose the Old Executive Mansion on Ashmun Street.

“In our view, this was your way of commencing the dictates of your mandate with the audit of the moral conscience of Liberia: evoking the sense of respect and reverence for national antiquities once cherished and giving priority to public assets over private ownerships.

“Having got a foothold over the swarms of wild rats and cockroaches and mountains of garbage which had found habitat in the once elegant and majestic home of Liberia’s First Families, your next crucial challenge was to recruit and configure the workforce–staff and personnel who will be willing to uncompromisingly resist the temptation of the past and to bear the cross of integrity, diligence, teamwork and professionalism which form the bulwark and doctrine of your anti-corruption crusade.”

The GAC staff boated that Morlu’s tenure witnessed strategic planning. “The roadmap of your incumbency was not blur,” they contend, adding, “it was not a hit and miss game”.

“It was grounded and compassed on a comprehensive five-year Strategic Plan, an initiative that is not only an unusual strategy in Liberia’s public sector governance culture, but which largely accounts for the precision, accuracy and success of your administration’s programs and activities.”

Today, the statement asserts, training and re-training is the palm oil with which staff of the GAC eat their daily professional food.

“While the GAC conference room is a daily classroom of staff, there are scores of others who have pursued or are pursuing various training programs abroad. Over 100 GAC staff were sent abroad to attend workshops, seminars and secondments to other SAIs. Your capacity building strategy was recently crowned by the enrolment of nearly fifty (50) young staff at Universities in the United States and Kenya pursuing post-graduate degrees.  Now GAC has close to 500 staff and 12 pursing graduate studies in the United States of America and 32 in Kenya.

“Indeed, Liberia’s economic transformation drive with emphasis on anti-corruption fight which you launched in 2007, coupled with its fruits and beneficiaries, is not ours to recount. Well-meaning Liberians behold it—and will cherish it forever. The world community acknowledges it and will forever use it as trigger for continued partnership here.”

GAC statement noted: “In your departing admonition to us, you asked us not to feel dejected or sorry for you because of your departure. This reminds us of the words of the Lord Jesus Christ when he was being whipped, tormented and scourged under the weight of his crucifixion cross. He told those who were shedding tears for his condition, “weep not for me; weep for yourselves, your fathers and your fathers’ fathers”.

The GAC staff averred: “You can rest assured that we are not dejected. The virtues of self-respect, determination and integrity–the unwavering anti-corruption fighting spirit–with which you have indoctrinated us remained firmly ingrained and deep-rooted.

“The fight has just started. And anyone who thinks your exit will derail our determination to fight on must think twice.”

The outgoing Auditor General in remarks thanked the GAC staff for being on his side in the fight against corruption.

Integrity matters, he said. “And this is why we were able to win this battle. It is not about job and money. We won because we espouse integrity over job. This is what I am leaving you with.”

The outgoing Auditor General said if he were called to do what he did in the last four years, he would do exactly the same way or even more that he has done, an apparent reference to his mode of operations which President Sirleaf disagreed with and formed her reason for not re-nominating him.

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