Abena Osei Asare questions GoldBod over GH¢4.54bn accounting treatment in 2025 financials
The Chairperson of Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) and Member of Parliament for Atiwa East, Abena Osei Asare, is demanding a public explanation from the Ghana Gold Board (GoldBod) over the accounting treatment of GH¢4.5477 billion in government funding in its 2025 financial statements.
In an article titled “GoldBod’s 2025 Accounts: The Unanswered GH¢4.5477 Billion Question”, the former Deputy Finance Minister said her review of GoldBod’s 2025 accounts revealed inconsistencies that require clarification.
According to her, GoldBod in its own Business Review describes the GH¢4.5477 billion provided by government as “revolving trade capital” to support gold purchasing, trading and export operations.
However, the same amount was recognised in the accounts as grant revenue and included in the institution’s reported surplus of about GH¢5.44 billion.
She further noted that elsewhere in the same report, GoldBod describes the amount as “unutilised government subvention”, with the accounts indicating that the full amount remained at the Bank of Ghana at the end of 2025.
“That leaves an obvious accounting question: How did GH¢4.5477 billion provided as revolving trade capital, and still unutilised at year-end, come to be recognised as revenue contributing to a reported surplus of about GH¢5.44 billion?” she queried.
Madam Osei Asare argued that the treatment raises concerns under the International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS).
She cited IPSAS 1, which requires financial statements to reflect the true substance of transactions, and IPSAS 23, which governs the treatment of government transfers depending on whether they are unconditional revenue, subject to conditions, or in substance capital contributions.
She also referenced the Public Financial Management Act, 2016 (Act 921), particularly Sections 79, 82 and 93, which require public financial statements to be properly prepared, consistently classified and capable of giving a true and fair view.
The PAC Chair further pointed to what she described as inconsistent figures for expenditure, surplus, total assets, net assets and GoldBod’s share of profit in GoldBod Jewellery Limited appearing in different parts of the same annual report.“A signed and audited annual report dealing with billions of cedis of public resources should not leave readers choosing between different figures for the same line item,” she stated, adding that IPSAS 1 requires consistency in financial reporting.
While acknowledging that GoldBod may have generated income from its operations, she said the core issue of how government money described as both revolving trade capital and unutilised subvention was treated as revenue remains unanswered.
She is therefore calling on the Directors of GoldBod to explain the accounting basis for the treatment and to reconcile the inconsistent figures in the report.
She also called on the Auditor-General to make public the Management Letter arising from the audit, to establish whether the matters were flagged and what explanations were provided.
“If there is a proper accounting basis for this treatment, it should be stated plainly. Public money of this magnitude should not be described as revolving capital in one part of the accounts, unutilised in another, and revenue in another without a clear reconciliation,” she added.
GoldBod has previously defended its accounting, stating that the treatment is consistent with IPSAS 23 on revenue from non-exchange transactions and that the accounts were audited by the Auditor-General with no adverse findings. The Board has also indicated that excluding the GH¢4.5477 billion government grant, it still recorded an operational surplus of about GH¢896.3 million from fees.
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