Dismissal of officials in Mauritania and the president threatens those involved in corruption news

Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Cheikh Al-Ghazouani dismissed senior officials from their positions after they were included in the Court of Accounts report, which identified numerous management imbalances that caused the loss of an estimated hundreds of millions of dollars from the state treasury.

In conjunction with the publication of the two decrees issued by the President, the Council of Ministers agreed at its meeting yesterday evening, Tuesday, to dismiss more than 20 prominent officials – including secretaries general of service ministries – on charges of corruption and harming state resources.

The Council of Ministers decided to refer all the officials who were dismissed to the judiciary to hold them accountable in accordance with the anti-corruption laws approved by the state in recent years.

The government said – in its statement issued after the meeting – that “in implementation of the President’s recommendations not to be complacent and to impose the maximum penalties on all those proven to have betrayed the public secretariat, the duties of all those mentioned by the Court of Accounts have been terminated, and the Public Prosecution will be entrusted with filing a case regarding everything that may be subject to penal action from among the facts recorded in the report of the Court of Accounts.”

In a related context, the Public Prosecution at the Supreme Court announced – today, Wednesday – that it had received the report issued by the Court of Accounts, and would work to exploit its content to initiate judicial follow-ups.

The Public Prosecution confirmed – in its statement – that it will pursue anyone who will be charged with acts that constitute embezzlement or waste of public funds, in accordance with applicable procedures and laws.

President Ghazouani had stressed – in a speech last Monday in Nouakchott, during the graduation ceremony of a class from the National School of Administration – that everyone involved in suspicion of corruption will be held accountable.

Al-Ghazwani called on the oversight and inspection bodies to exercise their full powers, stressing that he obligated the government to implement the recommendations of the oversight and inspection bodies.

He expressed his confidence that there is no reform without eliminating all forms of corruption, and Al-Ghazwani stressed that corruption reduces the effectiveness of the government’s efforts in the field of development.

He added, “I am certain that there is no hope for the success of reform without eliminating administrative and financial forms of corruption.”

The Mauritanian President’s statements come following the controversy raised by the Court of Accounts report for the years 2022 and 2023, which revealed widespread corruption in several government institutions.

For weeks, voices have been calling for those responsible to be held accountable for the corruption revealed in the report of the Mauritanian Court of Accounts, which showed a widespread waste of public money in various aspects of the state and its ministries, especially education, health, agricultural reclamation, and electric energy.