Ghana’s minister of sanitation and water resources resigned on Saturday following accusations that workers discovered and took stashes of local and international currency from her residence. She claimed this in a letter to the president, denying any wrongdoing.
Cecilia Dapaah made news on Friday when two former home employees were charged with stealing money and personal goods from the minister and her husband between July and October 2022.
Prosecutors informed the court that the accused used stolen money to buy residences and a vehicle, as well as give part of it to relatives. They have yet to respond to the allegations.
But newspaper reports on the $1 million, 300,000 euros, and millions of local cedis allegedly stolen from Dapaah’s home sparked outrage against the minister on social media and calls for her resignation.
Many questioned the origins of such sums of cash in a country where some members of President Akufo-Addo’s government have been embroiled in corruption scandals.
“Whereas I can state emphatically that those figures do not represent correctly what my husband and I reported to the police, I am very much aware of the import of such stories around someone in my position,” Dapaah said in her resignation letter.
“I do not want this matter to become a preoccupation of the government,” she said, adding that she would “no doubt” be exonerated.
The presidency accepted Dapaah’s resignation and lauded her work without commenting on the allegations.
Dapaah was appointed minister of sanitation and water resources when Akufo-Addo took power in 2017 and retained it when he was re-elected in 2021.
The president has vowed to crack down on corruption.
