NPP calls for non-partisan probe
The New Patriotic Party (NPP) has called for a non-partisan probe into the Ford Expedition car gift made to President John Mahama and the manner certain contracts were awarded to the Burkinabe who gave out the gift.
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It has, therefore, asked Parliament to, as a matter of importance, dig into the saga to unveil the circumstances surrounding the whole scandal.
At a press conference at the party’s Asylum Down headquarters in Accra yesterday, the Director of Communications of the party, Nana Akomea, said the party expected the matter to be probed to its logical conclusion.
He said the NPP had taken the action due to the circumstances surrounding the gift and the award of contracts to the Burkinabe contractor, Djibril Kanazoe.
Mr Kanazoe’s friendship with President Mahama is alleged to have earned the former some juicy contracts, among them the construction of a wall at the Ghana Embassy in Ouagadougou in Burking Faso at a cost of $650,000 and the construction of the Dodi Pepeso-Nkwanta stretch of the Eastern Corridor road worth 25.9 million euros.
The Burkinabe is said to have chickened out of a third contract — a 28-kilometre road project between Wa and Hamile in the Upper West Region, at an estimated cost of GH¢82 million — after the alleged Ford scandal broke.
Conflict of interest
Mr Akomea described the President’s decision to accept the vehicle and the award of contracts as conflict of interest which must be delved into to save the nation from any embarrassment before the international community.
He said while the government of Ghana did not dispute the chronology of events, it had sought, in its reaction to the story, to lower significantly the standard of integrity required of “our leaders”.
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“The President’s stance, as evidenced in the arrogant attitude of his ministers and staffers on this issue, is demoralising to the many honest men and women in public life who are doing their best under difficult circumstances to uphold ethical values,” he said.
According to him, the President, who was personally and directly involved in the bribery allegation, had thus far refused to speak on the matter, choosing, instead, to let his paid spokespersons to do so, adding: “My message to the President is this: ‘Mr President, please speak on your own behalf and in your own defence! The giver, your friend, has confessed that he has given his friend in government who has since helped him to secure government contracts a gift of a sports utility vehicle’.”
Explanation
Nana Akomea said the President must come out personally to answer the allegations and not delegate it to his underlings, as if to imply that it was a petty or unimportant matter.
He said the issue was of such importance that the President must not seek to trivialise it by evading it.
“We cannot allow the culture to be entrenched and legitimised in Ghana, where public works contract go only to the highest gift giver and to those with close connections in high places,” he stated.
He said the notion that the so-called gift was passed on to the state was a pitiful defence and clearly an afterthought, adding that the presidential fleet was not stocked through donations from private foreign contractors doing business with the government.
The Communications Director explained that if such was the practice, the country would be risking the personal security of the President and the staff at the Presidency.
He asked why duty was paid on the “gift” if ownership of it was intended to be passed on to the state.