1Francis Omane-Addo | 2David Ackah (PhD)
1Ghana Prison Service | 2Center for Excellent Training & Consultancy
Email: fomaneaddo@yahoo.com | drackah@ipmp.edu.gh
Abstract
Organizations put in place internal control measures with the view to ensuring that there is reliable financial reporting and management and strict compliance to all laid down governance structures so that they can achieve set targets (Ejoh & Ejom, 2014). It is also imperative to note that achieving excellent organizational performance is a daunting task (Nwachukwu & Emoh, 2011). Anderson (2014) indicated that many organizations have planned with clear objectives, yet failed miserably to perform. According to Amponsah and Darmoe (2014), a lot of organizations have performed abysmally to the disappointment of their stakeholders. Given these developments, Bruce (2014) argues that organizations have become extremely busy putting in place measures that will ensure that they maximize their performance. It is the case that public organizations are governmental in nature funded with taxpayers’ money and in this era of the devastating COVID-19 pandemic, national economic resources have even become scarcer to meet some pressing national needs. Hence the need for more prudent measures to be put in place to ensure that there is value for money. Notwithstanding considerable effort being made by government to promote prudent public financial management, it does appear that a chunk of funds of the state appropriated for development purposes goes down the drain due to acts of fraud and fraudulent activities by some public officials which stem from poor internal control systems. It is argued that internal controls system is significant in promoting good corporate governance in both public and private sectors. For example, Njui (2012) concluded in a study that internal controls system is the key driver of corporate governance practices in the public sector of Kenya. Similarly, Raletta and Alimehmeti (2016) evaluated internal controls impact on organizational performance using 1593 companies which involved a population of 15,606 executives for a period spanning 2002-2010. The study revealed that internal controls system was highly related to executive remuneration. Their study further established that weaker internal control systems result in higher executive remuneration. Furthermore, Gupta, Sami, and Zhou (2016) indicated that the quality of financial reporting of public companies is significantly enhanced by internal controls. Within the Ghanaian context, it is imperative to note that there are a number of studies both conceptually and empirically on internal controls in the public and private sectors of the economy (See Adom-Frimpong, 2019; Jianghuo, 2019; Koranteng, 2011; Affum, 2011; Ofori, 2011). Be that as it may, none of these studies focused on the public sector with clear emphasis on the Ghana Prisons Service. This has therefore created a gap in the extant literature. Against this backdrop of the gap in literature, this study will attempt to examine the internal controls system in Ghana Prisons Service.
Keywords: Internal Controls System, Ghana Prisons Service
