Stakeholders’ role in ensuring effective financial management in Ghana’s Public Universities: A qualitative analysis of University for Development Studies.

International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS) | Volume IV, Issue XII, December 2020 | ISSN 2454–6186

Stakeholders’ role in ensuring effective financial management in Ghana’s Public Universities: A qualitative analysis of University for Development Studies

Paul Tongkomah Saayir¹, William Antoorokuu Sande^2
1Department of Social and Business Education, SDD University of Business and Integrated Development Studies, Ghana, West Africa
²Directorate of Finance, SDD University of Business and Integrated Development Studies, Ghana, West Africa

Abstract: Financial management is an important aspect of public administration of every nation and one of the elements that make government effective. Public universities had some disregard for financial regulations, internal control mechanisms and widespread financial irregularities which led to financial losses per various audit reports. This study assessed stakeholder’s role in ensuring effective financial management. Key informant interviews and in-depth document analyses (reports analyses) were used to gather data. The findings were that; the University financial policies were adequately developed by top management but not well communicated to financial administrators; the university had weak budget supervision and monitoring as well as weak accounting and internal controls systems. The study recommended that the University should constitute a budgetary monitoring team to enhance its budgetary system, acquire up-to-date accounting software to facilitate its financial reporting and engage proactive professional internal auditors to raise the standard of the University internal control systems.

Key Words: Financial Management, Control Systems, Financial administrator, Budgeting and Internal Auditing

I. Introduction

Financial management is an important aspect of public administration of every nation and one of the elements that make government effective. The Institute of Certified Public Accountants of Kenya (ICPAK) provides that under Public Financial Management (PFM) a set of laws, rules and standards are essential to govern the systems and processes which are used by sovereign nations and sub-national governments, to mobilize revenue, allocate public funds, undertake public spending, account for funds and undertake audits (ICPAK, 2017). The objective of public financial management, according to ICPAK is to enhance efficiency and transparency in the use of public resources and eliminate wastage of public resources. The Public financial management is to achieve fiscal discipline, efficient and effective provision of public services, and efficient allocation of resources to reflect priority needs (Asare, 2008). Public financial management includes the legal and organisational framework for supervising all phases of the budget cycle, including the preparation of the budget, comparison of actual and budgeted revenues and expenditures, procurement, monitoring and reporting, as well as related internal controls and audits. Controls systems play important role in enhancing accountability and transparency in the governance process (Szymanski, 2007; Baltaci  & Yilmaz, 2006).
The Government of Ghana in order to ensure effective financial management policies, created some central financial systems which is the principal systems of the government, maintained by the Ministry of Finance to; process transactions, maintain the financial records of the government, and provide the data used in the preparation of financial statements and public accounts (Ghana’s Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, 2005). These systems also assist in departmental financial operations by providing information for monitoring and control of expenditure against appropriations of the legislature (Ghana’s Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, 2005).

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