The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament is urging the Auditor General to pursue pensioners who have embezzled state funds and retrieve the monies.

This comes after officials of the Fisheries Commission who appeared before the committee failed to render accounts of an amount of US$20,000 paid to former employees of the commission for their foreign travels and GH¢30,000 to some seven others to undertake related activities in the 2020 Auditor General’s report.

The officials of the Fisheries Commission said their inability to recover the monies was due to the poor condition of the retired workers.

But speaking at the Public Accounts Committee sittings, a member of the committee, Kwasi Amoako-Atta said all avenues must be deployed by the Auditor General to recover the funds.

“There are a lot of people in this country, who think that if they embezzle funds which constitutes criminality and they go on retirement, that should be the end of it. It is not true. Crime is not time-bound. Crime has no time limitation. Even if you are on retirement, you can be pursued to answer for your actions.  So even if they are on retirement we should ensure that they return the money to government.”