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Release
NPP-USA Legal Committee
February 10, 2012
What Does Woyome
say about the President?
The story of how top members of the government conspired with
Alfred Agbesi (aka Woyome) to defraud the Republic has been
told repeatedly, as it should. Indeed, “Woyome” should become
a required case study for all students in law, investigation,
ethics, business and public administration. While the public
discourse has properly focused on the enabling and
conspiratorial roles of the then Attorney General (AG) (and
her still at post Deputy Barton Oduro), the Minister of
Finance and other civil servants, there has been limited
effort to systematically explore the role that the President
played in this sordid saga.
Yet, the saga raises significant questions about the
President’s credibility, competence and corruption
credentials. It also raises questions about whether the
President has engaged in criminal activity (as a
coconspirator, compounder or an accessory after the fact).
Finally, the untenable and unprofessional conduct of the
Auditor General and Chairman of EOCO trigger the possibility
that they have been compromised or coerced into whitewashing
the President’s role in the saga. It is these matters that the
Legal Committee of NPP-USA intends to address in this press
release.
The Woyome saga raises questions about the President’s
Credibility
In his much-publicized Radio Gold interview on 12/23/2011,
the President announced that he had no problem with the
payment of the judgment debt to Woyome. His interest was in
pursuing those whose actions or inactions may have resulted in
the judgment debt. In his words, “we have to find out who
incurred the liability because if the court awarded the
judgment or awarded the cost, whatever it is, it’s a way of
saying that the beneficiary is entitled to it. (for a
transcript see,
The Statesman On Line).
In this interview, the President sought to portray himself as
a firm believer in the rule of law who saw nothing wrong with
the Republic being held accountable for violating her
contractual commitments. Indeed, the President portrayed
himself as knowing very little about the case and the payments
as (“When this case first broke, I was in the US and I ordered
the two ministries involved, at the Attorney General’s
Department and the Finance Ministry, to give me a report”),
and not interested in going after the beneficiaries.
However, subsequent events, particularly the EOCO report, show
that at the time of making those statements on Radio Gold, the
President was aware that there were very grave problems with
the Woyome payments, and had twice directed that actions be
taken to reverse the judgment or the payment.
Beyond this patent contradiction, the President’s actions and
inactions raise serious concerns about his credibility. First,
the President took no action against those who violated his
so-called directive. Indeed, we are yet to know the identity
of these recalcitrant persons. This alleged directive, if
given, must have been in or before June 2010. But the likely
recipients of the directives remained at post till January
2012 (when Betty Mould resigned as a minister) or are still in
office (in the case of Barton Oduro, Martey Newman and Kwabena
Duffuor). By way of contrast, the President hurriedly fired
Martin Amidu, whose only offence was to point out that his
colleague ministers had engaged in a gargantuan fraud against
the Republic. What is the justification for chasing out a
truthful minister while retaining those who had violated a
directive not to pay over GH¢50M?
Even more devastating for the President’s credibility, he was
a direct beneficiary of the funds when Woyome financed the
live-broadcast of the President’s ostentatious multi-hour
parade to pick up his nomination forms from the NDC party
headquarters on May 6, 2011. It has since been revealed that a
substantial portion of the Woyome funds went to the NDC to
finance the construction of its new headquarters. Finally, at
the time that Woyome financed the trip of “party supporters”
to South Africa for the World Cup (June 2010), the President
was aware that Woyome was the recipient of judgment debt that
the President had directed not be paid. The June 2010 date is
significant because it coincides with a significant tranche of
the judgment debt being credited to Woyome’s account, at the
bank owned by the Minister of Finance.
Lastly, as we write the President retains Barton Oduro as a
deputy AG, who is on record as saying, “Woyome had a strong
case and the Republic had a bad case. I saved Ghana millions
of dollars by reaching a settlement with Woyome." This Deputy
AG is, we are to believe, able to partake in the prosecution
of Woyome. But the Deputy AG is not alone. Alex Segbefia,
Akyena Brentuo, etc. are just but a few examples of Castle
Staff who justified the payments to Woyome, with full
knowledge of the President’s non-payment directive.
The Woyome saga raises questions about the President’s
Competence
The Woyome saga would be sufficient to cause the CEO of most
organizations to lose their jobs and face multiple lawsuits
from shareholders. For how can a CEO justify staying in office
after allowing over GH¢50M of the organization’s funds to be
paid to a “financial engineer” who alleges that he has
suffered damages from raising an unused credit line of over
$1B? Such a loss not only represents a complete collapse of
internal controls in the organization but also can occur only
when the management of the organization is utterly
incompetent.
The level of incompetence needed for this loss to occur in the
case of a country has to be gargantuan indeed. A simple demand
for proof of the existence of the escrow account of the $1B
will be enough to dispense of the frivolous claim. It is,
therefore, difficult and painful to contemplate and fathom how
a judgment payment of this magnitude can be made without some
form of due diligence, cabinet approval, or some similar
checks, especially since the payments were fast-tracked, ahead
of payments to salaried teachers.
The President has attempted, unsuccessfully, to proffer two
lines of mutually exclusive defense: an initial plea of
ignorance and a subsequent plea, via EOCO, of helplessness (I
did my best but they won’t follow my directive). Both pleas
are incredible on the facts, as we have come to know them, but
point to a President who has lost his cabinet, is unfit to
lead the country and who is desperately trying to hide
something more sinister. For how could the President retain
Barton Oduro and force out Martin Amidu? How can the legal
officer at the Finance Ministry (Mr. Paul Asimenu), whose
opinion neither the Finance Minister nor the AG is bound by,
be charged for abetment of crime, and the Finance Minister,
who made the payment, and the Attorney General, who took the
decision and insisted that Woyome must be paid, be both
walking free? How does this President expect anyone to take
seriously the proposition that the new AG and Barton Oduro
(the deputy AG) will successfully prosecute this criminal
cause?
The Woyome saga raises questions about whether the President
has engaged in Criminal Activity (Coconspirator and
Compounding)
The EOCO report indicates that the President was aware of the
Woyome saga and he had reason to believe that the settlement
and subsequent payment was improper. The President was also
aware that his directives to stop the settlement and payments
had been violated as far back as June 2010, although he took
no further actions until January 2012. The President has also
benefitted directly from the payments. These facts raise two
important questions. First, was the President a coconspirator
in this scheme to defraud the Republic? Second, did the
President compound this fraud when he failed to take steps to
report the fraud to the law enforcement agencies and accepted
benefits from Woyome?
The evidence that the President could be a coconspirator is
overwhelming. It is abundantly clear that this conspiracy was
hatched at the highest level of government. No less a person
than the former AG (Amidu) has accused his colleague ministers
of committing a gargantuan fraud against the Republic.
Moreover, the fast track resolution of the case, including the
possible use of fraudulent documents, and settlement of the
debt could not have occurred without the complicity of the
then AG Betty Mould, lawyers for Woyome (who incidentally are
NDC leading members), Minister of Finance and the Castle. The
President’s multiple conflicting statements on this matter are
evidence that he is trying to conceal something sinister and
should attract the attention of any serious investigator or
prosecutor.
An investigator or a prosecutor will be derelict if they
failed to address one question: Why is the Finance Minister,
who authorized the payments of the funds to Mr. Woyome, in
violation of the President’s directive, still at post? Why are
Betty Mould and Kwabena Duffuor, who in the President’s words,
were "so criminal-minded, so irresponsible to give GH¢58
million to one person," not facing prosecution?
There is only one plausible answer to this question. These
ministers acted on the instructions of the President.
But if there are doubts that the President is a coconspirator,
there should be no doubts at all that the President’s silence
and failure to act since June 2010 has compounded this crime.
In most jurisdictions, the President will be treated as an
accessory after the fact.
Whether as a coconspirator, a compounder or an accessory after
the fact, it is apparent that the President has a criminal
case to answer in this sordid affair.
The Woyome saga raises questions about the President’s
ability and commitment to fight corruption
Without prejudice to the nature of his involvement in this
saga, the President’s mere involvement in the Woyome saga has
rendered him impotent in the fight against corruption. He has
surrounded himself with corrupt ministers and financial
engineers, whom he is unable to get rid off even when the
evidence of their wrongdoing is overwhelming and
notwithstanding the public outcry and outrage. Notwithstanding
his supposed directive, Woyome remained a chief financier of
the NDC and only recently resigned (not fired) his position as
Board Chairman of the National Board for Small Scale
Industries.
The poisonous effect that the retention of people, like Barton
Oduro and Alex Segbefia, has on the moral of public servants
cannot be overstated. How can the President perform his
functions as the Chief Law Enforcement officer when he is neck
deep in the most gargantuan crime ever committed against the
Republic?
The President’s involvement in the Woyome saga is
Corrupting our Institutions
In the most dangerous after shock of the Woyome saga, there
appears to be a systematic effort and enterprise to coerce and
compromise other institutions into whitewashing the
President’s role in the crisis. For instance, the Auditor
General inexplicably attempted to retract his report by
devaluing the payments actually made to Woyome. The EOCO,
chaired by a leading member of the NDC, prepared a shoddy,
incomplete and unprofessional report with gaping holes,
unsupported conclusions and ignored clues. For instance, while
EOCO highlighted a GH¢400,000 payment to the wife of one the
civil servants involved in the conspiracy, the report was
silent on other payments made from Woyome’s account, including
the funding of supporters to South Africa, which is public
knowledge. Predictably, the ministers of information support
these glaring absurdities and proclaim that the Woyome case
has enhanced the integrity of the President. How many of our
institutions are going to be contaminated by the President’s
involvement in Woyome?
Conclusion
The Woyome saga has exposed the President as a corrupt chief
law enforcement officer who lacks credibility and competence;
who overtly or covertly may be coercing, compromising and
corrupting our anti-corruption agencies to whitewash his role
in Woyome; and who may have engaged in criminal activity.
Alas, there appears to be a well-orchestrated scheme to use
the judicial process to siphon funds from the Republic to so
called financiers of the NDC. In the three years that this
President has been in office, over GH¢640M judgment debts have
been paid. Included in these payments, is €38m (over GH¢80M)
paid to Ernesto Tarraconi (aka Waterville Inc.) who, by his
own admission (through his lawyers and through his legal
inaction from 2006-09) and official records, were owed no
money by the Republic and, like Woyome, deserved not a pesewa
from the state. Curiously, EOCO seemed to have missed this
glaring fraud! Similarly, there is a €94m payment to
Construction Pioneers, through another "negotiated
settlement," for a claim that the NPP had contested for eight
years.
Our national resources are not safe under this President,
either because of his complicity, in a sophisticated criminal
scheme that abuses the judicial process to transfer funds to
party financiers, or his incompetence.
Source: NPP – USA Legal Committee
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