Kan Dapaah storms Judgement Debt committee sitting
A former Minister of Energy in the Kufuor administration, Mr Albert Kan-Dapaah, yesterday stormed the Judgement Debt Commission public sitting in Accra voluntarily to request a hearing on matters relating to the sale and disbursement of proceeds from a Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) drill ship in 2001.
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After receiving a request letter from the former Energy Minister, the Sole Commissioner, Justice Yaw Apau, told him: “You will hear from us soon”.
That opener to the commission’s sitting turned out to be a foretaste of another bout of intriguing revelations on the sale of the GNPC drill ship, with the name of Mr Kan-Dapaah popping up in many of the issues flagged by witnesses as inappropriate.
From hindsight, Mr Kan-Dapaah’s decision to voluntarily submit to the scrutiny of the commission could be deemed very appropriate because there were so many issues for him to answer.
Sale of drill ship
The commission made it clear that anyone connected to the sale of the drill ship for the payment of judgement debt would be invited to testify.
The GNPC is said to have sold its drill ship, Discoverer 511, in July 2001 to pay judgement debt awarded in favour of Societe Generale by a UK court.
But evidence emerging from the Judgement Debt Commission suggests that the GNPC does not have the transaction records of the sale ordered by the Ministry of Energy, while the Bank of Ghana (BoG) does not have records of any cash transfer before and after the sale of the drill ship.
Transaction not normal
When the Chief Director of the Ministry of Energy, Professor Thomas Mba Akabza, appeared before the commission, he threw more puzzles into the fray, saying, the transaction on the sale of Discoverer 511 was not normal.
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He said it was strange that Mr Kan-Dapaah, under whose tenure as Energy Minister the drill ship was sold, did not captured the transaction in his handing-over notes (a copy of which he submitted to the commission) upon leaving the ministry.
According to Professor Akabza, a letter purported to have been written by Mr Kan-Dapaah to the GNPC on the proceeds from the sale of the drill ship did not have any reference number and was not copied to anyone.
He said although a minister of state had liberty to personally write letters, it was not a normal practice for him or her to do so without recourse to the Chief Director.
No GNPC board
Earlier, the Chief Executive Officer of the GNPC, Nana Boakye Asafu-Adjaye, had told the commission that when Societe Generale took the matter to court in London, the legal team of the GNPC was asked to step aside for the AG to take over.
He said after the Kufuor administration had taken office in 2001, a new GNPC Board was appointed in September 2001, which meant at the time the drill ship was sold in July 2001, the GNPC did not have any board.
That submission whipped up the curiosity in Justice Apau: “If there was no board, then who granted the power of attorney to sell the drill ship?”
By Kofi Yeboah/Daily Graphic/Ghana
Writer’s Email: kofi.yeboah@graphic.com.gh