The immediate past Chief of Staff, Mr. Kwadwo Mpiani, has damned the interim audit report presented by the Auditor-General to the government transition team. He said presenting the interim audit report, which has damning revelations about the Ghana@50 celebrations, as the final report is “wrong and unprofessional.” Speaking to Joy FM’s Super Morning Show host, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, Mr. Mpiani said while the Auditor-General, Mr. Edward Dua-Agyeman in a letter requested that he (Mpiani) responds to queries in the report by February 26, he went ahead to present it and sought to create the impression that there was wrong doing. Media reports say the Ghana@50 Secretariat spent US$60 million on the celebration, way above the US$20 million which Parliament initially approved for the celebration in 2007. The Secretariat also owes about GH¢18 million to contractors. The media reports said the Ghana@50 Secretariat did not have internal audit coverage and that there was apparent low level of skills of the Accounting Staff of the Secretariat. But Mr Mpiani is confident there was wrong doing and promised to respond fully to all the issues raised well before the February 26 deadline given by Mr. Dua-Agyeman. He believes the transition team is using the report to malign the previous government questioning the rationale for pressuring the Auditor-General to present the report when the persons against whom adverse findings had been made had not responded to the issues. He also questioned the motive for putting the report out into the public domain. "If government wishes to appoint a commission of inquiry to investigate the issues it has every right to do but to use a transition team as a backdoor to malign others is wrong," he said. The transition team, he contends, could also call him to appear before it to explain some but that did not happen. Mr. Mpiani said he has answers to all the issues and expects that when he does answer them, the Auditor-General will go back to the public and correct the wrong impression he created. Responding to claims by the CEPS Commissioner that 139 vehicles could not be traced, the former Chief of Staff asked since when the CEPS Commissioner became the custodian of government vehicles. He said it does not lie with the CEPS Commissioner to determine how government vehicles are appropriated. He stressed if anybody has a problem with the whereabouts of any vehicles, he Mpiani should be the first port of call. Story by Malik Abass Daabu