�4 billion Blown On NPP Serial Callers - Reveals Audit Report

The Herald�s newspaper investigations into claims that some politicians are praying people to twist facts and paint perfect pictures in the minds of the citizenry about events, have unearthed a long list of serial-callers who have been on the payroll of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) since 2001. The list, in addition to excerpts from an audit report as well as some memos in the custody of The Herald, exposes Nana Akomea as a dishonest politician in pointing accusing fingers at others as bribing journalists to promote the National Democratic Congress (NDC) ahead of the 2012 elections. Between January 2007 and January 2008, Akomea�s NPP spent not less than four billion, two hundred and fifty-nine million, three hundred and eight thousand cedis (�4,259, 380, 000). The serial-callers phone into a newspaper review programmes of radio stations in the morning, to shape public opinion on issues, as they paint pleasant pictures about their party and its presidential candidate. Their identities, phone numbers and other details were released to The Herald by sources at the NPP headquarters. Most often, the stations they call into on daily basis are Peace FM 104.3 and Adom FM 106.3. These station�s morning newspaper review programmes - the popular �Kokrokoo� and �Dwaso Nsem�-are hosted by Kwami Sefa-Kayi and Adakabre Frimpong-Manso respectively. Indications are that it was these persons who became anonymous groups such as PRIM, Matters Arising, BLOW, GRID, Rapid Response, Media Monitoring and first Responders, among others, which operated at the Ministry of Information and National Orientation, under Oboshie Sai-Coffie and Stephen Asamoah-Boateng and drew so much money from the state kitty. An audit report on the financial activities of the Ministry of Information for the period January 1, 2007 to January 31, 2008 revealed that as part of the Communication Strategy Implementation Programme, �a total of GH�425,938 was spent on these items. This expenditure included allowances and travel expenses paid to people whose identities were not disclosed�. According to the auditors, �two former Chief Directors of the Ministry, Messrs Albert A. Ampong and Dominic A. Y. Sampong, who were in office at the time the teams operated, as well as other key staff, could not provide us the meaning of the acronyms (PRIM, BLOW, and GRID), the names of the team members and their terms of engagement�. This list is made up of names of individuals mostly based in the Ashanti Regional capital, Kumasi and has Samuel Osei Shiffman (Shiffman-Atonsu) 36 years of age, a make by gender and Sales Executives for Occupation as its co-ordinator.