- Fresh scrutiny hits Publican AI as IERPP demands full disclosure on customs deal
Ghana’s increasingly bitter dispute over the Publican AI customs system has entered a new phase, with the IERPP demanding full disclosure of the deal behind the technology and arguing that a platform with such growing influence over customs valuation and inspection cannot remain commercially opaque.
This intervention now shifts the argument beyond operational disruption and into the deeper question of public accountability. The demand, the institute wants clarity on the contractual arrangement between the state, including the Ghana Revenue Authority, and the private company behind the system, with particular focus on the cost structure, payment model and procurement process.
That broader scrutiny comes at a delicate moment for the government. The GRA has defended the Publican AI rollout, with Commissioner-General Anthony Kwasi Sarpong saying the procurement was handled with a high degree of transparency and arguing that the system is meant to modernise port operations, improve efficiency and reduce leakages. In separate comments reported earlier, the authority also credited the platform with helping expose substantial customs revenue losses.
But that official defence is now colliding with a widening front of resistance from the trade community. GUTA warned this week that the system has resulted in unpredictable and excessive duty assessments, clearance delays, and rising demurrage and rent charges, prompting a strike by freight forwarders and clearing agents. Other trade bodies, including GIFF, ACHAG, CUBAG, FFAG, FABAG and TAGG, have also publicly challenged the rollout and kept pressure on the authorities over what they describe as a worsening business climate at the ports.
IERPP’s demand sharpens that confrontation by focusing on what critics see as the weakest flank in the government’s case: transparency. The institute is seeking disclosure not only of the commercial arrangement, but also of the system’s methodology, data sources, legal basis and safeguards against bias, while raising questions about how importers are expected to challenge machine-driven assessments where human discretion appears limited.
That shift is significant because it reframes the Publican AI row from a simple implementation dispute into a test of governance. If the system is to become central to customs valuation, then the public case for it cannot rest only on promises of efficiency or anecdotal revenue gains. It must also survive scrutiny over procurement integrity, legal authority and fairness in application. That is now the burden IERPP is trying to place on the state. This is an analytical inference from the substance of the disclosure demands and the GRA’s defence.
The politics of the issue are further complicated by the mixed reaction among trade groups themselves. For policymakers, the problem is becoming harder to contain. A system introduced to improve revenue assurance is now under attack on at least three fronts: operational disruption, stakeholder legitimacy and contractual transparency. The longer those questions remain unanswered, the greater the risk that the Publican AI story shifts from one of digital reform to one of state overreach and policy mistrust.
That is why IERPP’s demand could prove more consequential than a routine protest statement. It raises the stakes from “is the system working?” to “on what terms was this system brought in, under what authority, and for whose benefit?” Until those questions are answered convincingly, the controversy around Publican AI is unlikely to ease.
