The Circuit Court in Accra trying the 10 officials of the Narcotic Control Board (NACOB) for their alleged deals in narcotic drugs Thursday adjourned the case to December 8, 2011 at the request of the prosecution.
Mr Rexford Wiredu, a Principal State Attorney, told the court, presided over by Mr Eric Kyei Baffour, that he was not ready for the proceedings because there was a mix-up of information regarding the date the case was to be called.
According to him, the defence counsel, Mr Dominic Ayine, had informed him the next sitting date was yesterday, but he (Wiredu) had inadvertently noted it as today for which reason he was in court to ask for an adjournment since he was not prepared for the case.
The accused persons are currently on GH�70,000 bail each with a surety.
They have pleaded not guilty to two counts of abetment of importation and abetment of exportation of narcotic drugs contrary to the Narcotic Drugs Law 1990 PNDCL 236 section 56(C) and (1)(1).
They are Fatimatu Abdulai, Dennis Adutwum Gyimah, Yakubu Issaka, Timothy Aboloimpo and Abubakar Nallah, Chief Executive Officer of Tudu Mighty Jets, a football club.
Others are Peter Ansong, Mutawa Kilu Yahaya Iddi, Jerry John Kwesi Abbiw, Eric Darko Akuffo and Nana Zamsah Evrah.
The accused persons were stationed at the national headquarters of NACOB in Accra, while some of them have ever worked or are presently stationed at the Kotoka International Airport.
According to the prosecution, during the period 2009 and 2011, the accused persons were supposed to check and arrest passengers who carried narcotic drugs.
Sometime in July this year, a narcotic drug suspect who had been on the wanted list of the United States of America for some time was arrested at Dansoman in Accra.
During investigations, text messages purported to have been received from Fatimatu Abdulai were found on the mobile phone of the said suspect.
The text messages pointed to the fact that Fatimatu Abdulai of the Procurement Unit of NACOB had, together with other NACOB officials, been aiding and abetting suspect Edward Macauley and others to import and export narcotic drugs through the airport.
Fatimatu was immediately arrested and, during interrogation, she admitted the act and mentioned some NACOB officers and personnel of other security agencies, including the other suspects, as having compromised their positions to allow drug couriers safe passage after they had received various sums of money from the drug dealers.
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