NPP: More Can Of Worms Will Emerge From Fraudulent Woyome Saga

The New Patriotic Party (NPP) has commended the Economic and Organised Crimes Office (EOCO) for its findings on the controversial GhC51 million judgment debt awarded Alfred Woyome. It said Ghanaians should brace themselves for more shocking revelations in the coming days. According to the chairman of the main opposition political party in Ghana, Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey, details of the report have confirmed the long-held position of the NPP that the whopping sum doled out to the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) financier was fraudulent and a complete mistake. The head of EOCO, Mr. Mortey Akpadzi, on Thursday presented the report to President Mills which stated that Mr. Woyome manipulated documents and information in order to receive what is now termed as one of the biggest judgment debts given to an individual in the political history of Ghana. The report said Mr. Woyome rode on the negligence and complicity of public officials to dupe the state of �money which he was clearly not entitled to�, adding that an amount of GhC400, 000 was �paid to the wife of Mr. Nerquaye-Tetteh [Chief State Attorney ] on June 16, 2011� but failed to mention reasons behind that payment. Speaking on the Citi Eyewitness News on Thursday, Mr. Obetsebi-Lamptey, said the report presented by EOCO has vindicated their stance ever since the �woyomegate� broke. �A lot of what has come up is what we were telling the people of this country from the very beginning that we saw this, some of these statements that we have made, the suggestions that we have put forward, the way the man was put up for investigations opens some of the suspicions that we had,� the former minister under the Kufuor administration said. Mr. Obetsebi-Lamptey added that Parliament must critically assess the report and conduct a full scale investigation into the matter to further expose President Mills whom he said lied on not having knowledge of the whole �fraudulent� payment. He said President Mills cannot absolve himself from the controversial payment to Mr. Woyome since he is the leader of government and was clearly aware of the payment. He, however, added that officials of the erstwhile NPP administration who have been implicated in the report are ever ready to appear before any credible body to protest their innocence.