Former Auditor-General Daniel Domelevo has admitted that during his tenure, the Operation Recover All Loot (ORAL) team collected and compiled data without verification — including entries he described as “garbage.”

Speaking on Joy News’ PM Express on October 22, he said the ORAL team’s work was limited to gathering complaints and documentation submitted by the public, without conducting any investigations to confirm their validity.

“I completely agree,” he said, responding to comments by the Deputy Attorney General that the estimated $21 billion expected to be recovered under ORAL was exaggerated.

“I remember I had an interview with you earlier, and I said that those figures are just a summation of the complaints which came. And I even said that after an audit or investigation, those figures may balloon further or may shrink. It is possible.”

He explained that the actual test of the figures would be in court, where the amounts could change significantly.

“The actual game is in the courtroom,” he said. “When you get to the courtroom, the amount may reduce significantly. And I caution. I remember saying that I know even if we should win the 21 or close to $22 billion, collecting it is another game altogether.”

Mr Domelevo emphasised that even after successful court rulings, recovering the money remained difficult.

“There are two lawyers who will tell you that even the fact that you have won the case in court does not necessarily mean you will collect the money,” he said. “I remember citing the Woyome case.

"The Supreme Court said pay. But it took some time. I don’t know up to now whether it has been fully paid. So winning the case is one thing, but recovering it is a different ball game.”

He said the ORAL figures represented raw, unfiltered data that had not been subjected to scrutiny. “As for us, we just collected data and summed it up. We didn’t do any investigation,” he noted.

“A preliminary investigation may even show that some of the complaints were just noise. There’s nothing in it. But we collected the data as it did so, including the garbage.”

When asked to clarify his use of the word “garbage,” Mr Domelevo said the team received every submission that came its way without turning anyone away.

“Yes, because nobody came to us that we turned away and said, Yours we will not take,” he explained.

“So we collected all the information. Remember, we are not investigating. So when you come, we are not going to say that Mr Mensah substantiates what you are saying.

"So you just come and say that I know Mr Amaliba is involved in this, that, that, that, the amount is this. We look at the document you have, and we capture it.”

He revealed that some complaints even came through emails, without any supporting evidence. “Some even came in the form of emails. What about if the person is just making it up?” he said.

Drawing from his auditing experience, Mr Domelevo said he knew some of the documents submitted might not have been authentic.

“Being an experienced auditor, I know that you can even submit documents, and later on, when we test the document, the documents may not have any substance, or they may not be authentic,” he said. “So there will be a lot of garbage in it. There’s no two ways about that.”

Mr. Domelevo also commended the Attorney General for taking time to correct public misconceptions about attempts to influence ORAL’s work.

“It is good that the Attorney General spends some time,” he said. “I listened to him. Clearly, he spent some time to disperse the view that anybody or any member or legal team of the NDC, for that matter, was trying to bribe their way through. I think that is very, very, very necessary.”