Audio Attachment:Listen to Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa |
A Deputy Minister for Information, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, is of the firm belief that there is no verve left in the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to go about shouting on rooftops that the payment of judgment debts is an act of �corruption� especially after the �exceedingly revealing� bombshell he dropped last Monday.
According to him, because he knew the revelation was going to do a lot of damage to Nana Addo�s reputation, he was compelled to state that the event was going to be �exceedingly revealing�.
At a news conference in Accra last Monday, a team of government officials led by Mr Ablakwa pontificated that the NPP flagbearer�s assertion that his administration will never condone judgement debts is false.
�In the spirit of transparency and full disclosure�, he presented two letters authored by Nana Akufo-Addo, to back his claim and slammed him for being insincere and a hypocrite. According to him, one of the first actions taken by the NPP leader when he assumed office as Attorney-General in 2011 was to justify the claims of a Swiss Company Great Cape for an outstanding settlement of over a million dollars.
The company had its contract to supply clinker to the government of Ghana in 1978 breached and has been asking for settlement.
In 1997, the then NDC government paid an amount of $927,000 in what was expected to be the final payment of the debt owed the company which had Dr Nat Tanoh as a local representative.
Brandishing the letters dated April 18, 2001 and October 3, 2011, which Nana Akufo-Addo authored, Mr Ablakwa said Nana Addo agreed to the payment of more than $1.1 million to the Swiss company, without further negotiations or court processes.
The deputy minister added that while the NPP flagbearer and his acolytes had stated that judgement debts connoted corruption, he had been busily advocating, behind the scenes, that Great Cape Company of Switzerland be paid the said amount in what he (Akufo Addo) referred to as �Great Cape�s legitimate claims.�
�Do you think that now the NPP can say that judgment debt is corruption again? Are you hearing them?...Ghanaians are shocked. They didn�t know that whilst they (NPP) were saying that 'judgment debt is corruption�that why are people acting as ambassadors of companies�they have kickbacks in it, this is fraudulent on the state and the people of Ghana are being deceived�Ghana is for �donkomi� and all of that'� once they (NPP) were telling Ghanaians this, they are busily writing that let us pay the Great Cape Company,� Mr. Ablakwa said in an interview on Radio Gold�s 60 Minutes.
He added that the press conference last Monday blown the lid over Nana Addo and the NPP�s �double standards, their duplicity and their hypocrisy�.
The deputy information minister further stated that his expos� also has far-reaching consequences for Nana Addo�s image.
�Every electorate, every voter, what they look for in a candidate is a candidate that they can trust�a candidate who is sincere and honest. Not one who comes to tell them different things publicly from what they write secretly. If this letter was to be copied to the press, do you think Nana Addo would have written it?� he asked.
In a voice tinged with derision, Mr. Ablakwa wondered the vituperative language against him on social network sites such as facebook and twitter if the NPP truly believed he misfired and the press conference was simply a shoddy attempt at equalization.
Source: Chris Joe Quaicoe/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana
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