Government Of Ghana have Abort Power Concession Agreement with Power Distribution Services (PDS) Ghana Limited

The enquiry, to be conducted both within and outside the country, according to the Minister of Energy, Mr John Peter Amewu, would, among other things, establish who made false representations to the government to drive it into the agreement.

Mr Amewu told the Daily Graphic in an interview that the investigations would last for 30 days, by which time the full facts would be known and a definite decision taken.
He said a high-powered government delegation had been dispatched to Qatar to ascertain some facts relating to documentation on the agreement.
Last Tuesday night the government suspended the concession agreement with PDS Ghana Limited.
Mr Amewu assured the public that the distribution of power would not be affected.
He also indicated that the suspension would neither affect the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) compact nor lead to job losses, adding: “It is only a suspension.

Suspension
A statement signed and issued by the Minister of Information, Mr Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, said the decision followed the “detection of fundamental and material breaches of PDS’s obligation in the provision of Payment Securities (Demand Guarantees) for the transaction which were discovered upon further due diligence”.
“The demand guarantees were key prerequisites for the lease of assets on 1st March, 2019 to secure the assets that were transferred to the concessionaire,” it added.
 It said the government had taken steps to ensure that distribution, billing and payment services were not uninterrupted and assured the public that the development would in no way interfere with the distribution of electricity services to customers.

PDS’s response
Yesterday morning, the PDS responded to the suspension and sought to play down any wrongdoing on its part.
A statement the company issued said: ”The PDS has taken note of the statement issued by the government.... and wishes to state for the record that it had always acted and would continue to act in good faith at all times.”
It said the company would go through due process “by complying with the terms of the transaction agreement executed between it and the Electricity Company of Ghana, on the one hand, and the government, through the Ministry of Finance, on the other.
“PDS wishes to assure the Ghanaian public that it will not rush to put out any information until it has been sufficiently substantiated, in the interest of safeguarding the transaction and the image of Ghana,” it submitted.
There were fears within the energy industry that the MCA compact, under which the PDS agreement was signed, would come under threat following the development, but Mr Amewu said otherwise.
Ghana signed an agreement with the US government for the release of $498.2 million to support the transformation of Ghana’s electricity sector and stimulate private investment.
The first tranche of $308.2 million was released in 2016 and the country is awaiting the release of the second tranche on the successful implementation of the first phase.

Per the MCC agreement, the second tranche, amounting to $190 million, will be released after Ghana meets requirements to access the fund.
Energy think tanks demand investigations
In the wake of the ensuing development, some energy think tanks have called for full-scale and impartial investigations into the matter to unravel the circumstances that led to what many have described as “a grievous embarrassment to the state”.
The Africa Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP) said the situation, if confirmed by the government’s ongoing investigations, would represent a significant embarrassment caused to Ghana by the Millennium Development Authority (MiDA) and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) who were paid to protect the interest of the country and ensure the efficient spending of US public funds granted to Ghana.
Subsequently, it said, while “the ACEP commends the government for quickly mobilising the state apparatus to protect public interest, it demands the immediate interdiction of the leadership of MiDA to prevent tampering with evidence that may be necessary to support the case of the state”.

News conference
Addressing a news conference in Accra yesterday, the Executive Director of ACEP, Mr Ben Boakye, also called on the government to “cease the consumption of advice from the IFC on the transaction with immediate effect. This is because the IFC has proved incapable of defending the interest of its clients, MiDA and the government”, reports Charles Benoni Okine.
Finally, he called for an immediate audit of the backgrounds of the beneficial owners of the local partners of PDS.
Using other findings to back his demand, Mr Boakye said: “Today, we are told that the negligence of MiDA to ensure proper due diligence on the payment securities provided by PDS has led to likely fraudulent misrepresentation by the PDS and its guarantors.”
According to him, preliminary information available to ACEP showed that the insurance provided by PDS had been declared fraudulent by the Qatar-based Alkoot Insurance.
“While this situation is under investigation by the government of Ghana, ACEP believes that the contested document could have been deemed suspicious if MiDA and the transaction advisors (IFC) had showed the slightest seriousness and placed Ghana first,” he added.
He adduced three reasons to substantiate his assertion:

Reasons
“The requirement of bank guarantee, as prescribed under the concession, was changed to insurance bond to fit the weak capacity of the concessionaire to raise the needed bank guarantee,” Mr Boakye said.
That, he explained, was in breach of the requirement approved by Parliament to securitise the ECG’s assets worth $18 billion, in compliance with Schedule 10 of the Lease and Assignment Agreement (LAA).
“It is, therefore, unthinkable that MiDA and the IFC would bend the processes to suit PDS, knowing that the effect of a bank guarantee and an insurance bond are not the same.
“While the bank guarantee can be called upon without recourse, the same cannot be said of the insurance bond. Secondly, the $350 million insurance bond produced by PDS was signed by only the managing director of the issuer.
“While the bank guarantee can be called upon without recourse, the same cannot be said of the insurance bond. Secondly, the $350 million insurance bond produced by PDS was signed by only the managing director of the issuer.
“It has emerged that the MD’s signature was forged, an issue that raises significant questions about why nobody detected that a transaction of this scale should have adhered strictly to the procedures of the issuer and corporate governance principles requiring the signature of at least one additional board member.
“ACEP has sighted Alkoot Insurance’s response to the ECG acknowledging that the MD could not have had the sole capacity to sign the guarantee. Yet, the IFC and MiDA did not detect this,” Mr Boakye noted.
The third reason he adduced was that persistent cautions by the ECG on the weaknesses of the bond issued were ignored.
“Perhaps the ECG was seen to be a detractor of the concession process and not a relevant party interested in properly securitising the assets of the company. Eventually, the ECG is the one that managed to unravel the alleged fraud,” he stated.
He also questioned how PDS and the local insurance company, Donewell, could not know the capacity of the individuals they worked with in Alkoot Insurance in Qatar
“While the bank guarantee can be called upon without recourse, the same cannot be said of the insurance bond. Secondly, the $350 million insurance bond produced by PDS was signed by only the managing director of the issuer.
“It has emerged that the MD’s signature was forged, an issue that raises significant questions about why nobody detected that a transaction of this scale should have adhered strictly to the procedures of the issuer and corporate governance principles requiring the signature of at least one additional board member.
“ACEP has sighted Alkoot Insurance’s response to the ECG acknowledging that the MD could not have had the sole capacity to sign the guarantee. Yet, the IFC and MiDA did not detect this,” Mr Boakye noted.
The third reason he adduced was that persistent cautions by the ECG on the weaknesses of the bond issued were ignored.
“Perhaps the ECG was seen to be a detractor of the concession process and not a relevant party interested in properly securitising the assets of the company. Eventually, the ECG is the one that managed to unravel the alleged fraud,” he stated.
He also questioned how PDS and the local insurance company, Donewell, could not know the capacity of the individuals they worked with in Alkoot Insurance in Qatar
He accused the government of failing to take advice on the agreement, which had led to the current situation.
He said when the PDS took over, it could not bring about any changes and that everything was left in the hands of the ECG to manage.
He said after ratifying the agreement, the expectation was that the government was going to take steps to protect the interest of the people but, unfortunately, it had not done that.
For his part, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Member of Parliament for Bongo, Mr Edward Bawa, blamed the government for failing to ensure due diligence before striking the agreement.
Mr Bawa, who was a communications consultant to the Energy Ministry in the erstwhile NDC government, said the deal was entered into in a rush.
According to him, the latest development was an embarrassment to Parliament which ratified the arrangement

Goverment Suspends PDS Concession Agreement

The government through the Ministry of Finance and the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) Limited has suspended the concession agreement with Power Distribution Services (PDS) Ghana Limited with immediate effect.

A statement signed and issued by the Minister of Information, Mr Kojo Oppong Nkrumah on Tuesday evening - July 30, 2019 - said the decision followed the detection of fundamental and material breaches of PDS’ obligation in the provision of Payment Securities (Demand Guarantees) for the transaction which have been discovered upon further due diligence.
“The Demand Guarantees were key prerequisites for the lease of assets on 1st March, 2019 to secure the assets that were transferred to the concessionaire,” the statement said.
It added: “The government is conducting a full enquiry into the matter, and the outcome will inform the next course of action. Government has taken steps to ensure distribution, billing and payment services continue uninterrupted.”
The government assured the general public and customers “that this development will not interfere with the distribution of electricity services to customers.”

Security Experts commenting on Removal of the Inspector-General of Police (IGP)

Three security experts commenting on the recent removal of the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), David Asante-Apeatu, from office have given a similar verdict: it was unprofessional.

Col Festus Boahen Aboagye (retd), Adam Bonaa and Paul Avuyi said on PM Express Tuesday that David Asante-Apeatu’s sudden removal was poorly managed and bad for the police administration.

President Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo on Monday directed Mr Asante-Apeatu to proceed on leave with immediate effect, pending his retirement from the police service on Wednesday, August 14, 2019.

He also asked the Deputy Inspector General of Police, Mr James Oppong-Boanuh, to act as IGP until a substantive IGP is appointed.

On MultiTV’s PM Express, Mr Paul Avuyi, a former police chief, was the first point out the anomaly in Mr Asante-Apeatu’s removal, stating that for him, “the curiosity in the whole thing is that he [Mr Asante-Apeatu] had only four weeks’ extension of service to end and then he was asked to proceed on leave.”

The norm, he revealed, was that when a top police chief was due to retire, he was given a notice for at least a year and during that period, a notice will officially indicate when the terminal leave begins.

Adam Bonaa, CEO of Security Warehouse, also said on the show that he thinks Mr Asante-Apeatu was chased out of office.

“If you have an IGP whom you have asked to serve, you have given an extension to for two years and you call him one morning and tell him that, with immediate effect, he should leave the office. So he drives the GP1 in the morning and in the afternoon, by 1 O’clock he is no more. No dispatch rider in front of him. It doesn’t happen that way,” he said.

Col Aboagye (retd) said the sudden removal of Mr Asante-Apeatu was unprecedented and it deserves all the attention it can get to send a strong message to the power brokers.

“Granted that the President has the prerogative to appoint and then to release, I think the office of the IGP should be entitled to some considerable amount of respect...it is not only about the IGP that should not be treated that way, but it is also about the entire service – the image within the public sphere.

“And granted that this gentleman has served his country for around 30 years, for him to be released under these circumstances, for reasons that nobody seems to know…I don’t it is the way we should treat very senior officers,” he told show host Evans Mensah.

Special Prosecutor wonders if the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Communication Director has taken up that responsibility.

Member of Parliament (MP) for Adentan Constituency in the Greater Accra Region, Yaw Buaben Asamoa has been quizzed why he has taken over as spokesperson for the Criminal Investigation Department as though it is a deaf and dumb department.

Special Prosecutor, Martin Amidu wonders if the department cannot speak for itself for which reason the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Communication Director has taken up that responsibility.

“Hon. Yaw Buaben Asamoa latched on my explanation and information to the public through the interview to run to the defence of the Criminal Investigation Department as though it is a Department of deaf and dumb”, he said in a statement sighted by MyNewsGh.com on Tuesday July 23, 2019.

Mr. Amidu is accusing the NPP executive of interfering in his work and seeking to direct him on what to do revealing that he is not an ignoramus to be remote-controlled.

“Hon. Yaw Buaben Asamoa did this by pretending to be directing me as an ignoramus on how to perform the duties of my Office. Hon Yaw Buaben Asamoa as the Communication Direct of his party on a previous occasion had the audacity to use the media to instruct me to prosecute “the low hanging fruits, whatever that means." He averred.

"Hon. Yaw Buaben Asamoa as the Communications Director of his party thinks that Ghanaians are so foolish that they may not suspect that his verbal attack on my Office in the media on Monday may be construed by rational citizens as a subtle way of defending the CID and a party colleague who was the subject of the alleged exoneration. He appears to pretend not to understand that there are several subtle ways of interfering with and indirectly stopping a fair investigation."
 In his response to Mr. Asamoa, the Special Prosecutor said he viewed the remarks as an attempt to “tacitly instruct” the way he run his office.

“Hon. Yaw Buaben Asamoa latched on my explanation and information to the public through the interview to run to the defence of the Criminal Investigation Department as though it is a Department of deaf and dumb. Hon. Yaw Buaben Asamoa did this by pretending to be directing me as an ignoramus on how to perform the duties of my Office.”

In further criticism, Mr. Amidu cautioned that Mr. Asamoa was also interfering ins is work because “there are several subtle ways of interfering with and indirectly stopping a fair investigation.”

Mr. Asamoa has since apologised to Mr. Amidu, for telling him to stop complaining about interference in his work.

“If he [Martin Amidu] believes that my remarks are indirectly directing him, then I am afraid I am sorry for having said that because I will be the last person to attempt to direct him,” Mr. Asamoa said on Eyewitness News.

Name and shame anyone involved in these Invincible Forces.

A National Democratic Congress (NDC) Member of Parliament (MP) appearing before the Short Commission of Inquiry has said the naming and shaming of politicians who own vigilante groups can halt the menace.

“Name and shame anyone involved in these activities,” Mr. Sam Nartey George told the Commission when he made his second appearance before them Tuesday.

In the wake of violence which marred the recent Ayawaso by-elections, the President has set up the Emile Short Commission to – among others – make recommendations that can forestall future occurrences.

Mr. George’s testimony before the Commission has become necessary following media footage that captured him being assaulted by men said to be National Security operatives but whom he claims are members of the governing New Patriotic Party’s Invincible Forces.

According to Mr. Samuel Nartey George, many of those who own vigilante groups “occupy prominent positions in this country or have occupied prominent positions.” But without naming and shaming these people,” he added that “we will be engaged in a pretentious exercise.”

Mr. George, who claimed to be “a victim of party militia,” said the “biggest issue” dealing with party militia “is the politicians taking ownership of these groups.”

This latest stance of the Ningo Prampram MP comes a day after he had claimed before the Short Commission that the NDC Party militia, the “Azorka Boys” are owned by the party’s National Vice Chairman, Mr. Sofo Azorka, even though he will rather “refer to them as a community-based organization,” involved in borehole drilling.

Ayawaso West Wuogon voilence: Sam George narrates how he was assaulted

Volume 90%

 

President Akufo-Addo Akufo-Addo Announced New Created Regions

Goaso has been named the capital of the newly created Ahafo Region at a ceremony at the Jubilee House on Wednesday.

President Akufo-Addo Akufo-Addo announced the decision when he presented the Constitutional Instrument to back the creation of the new region to Chiefs in the Ahafo region.

In his address, the president said he was impressed with the commitment of the people towards the creation of the region, adding that, about a total of 20, 203 people attended all five sittings by the commission of inquiry for the creation of the new regions in the country.

Akufo-Addo named Evans Opoku Bobie, the Member of Parliament for Asunafo North and Minister of the Brong Ahafo Region to act as care-take minister of the new region.

The Ahafo region, like the other new regions, will receive GHs 20 million as seed capital.

Goaso, which has been named the region’s capital, has been the capital of Asunafo North municipality and is located between three major towns; Mim, Kukuom and Hwidiem.

Apart from Goaso which has eventually been named the regional capital for the region, various groups were lobbying for areas including Duayaw-Nkwanta, Bechem and Kenyasi to be named as the regional capital.

Earlier reports also suggested that Goaso or Bechem would end up being named the new region’s capital.

Residents in the areas marked for the creation of the new Ahafo Region in December 2018 voted massively for its creation from the Brong Ahafo Region.

90 percent voters within the Ahafo enclave turned out to vote, with 99.68% of them endorsing the creation of the region, while 0.24% voted against it.

The enclave, made up of some six municipalities and districts; namely Tano South Municipality, Tano North Municipality, Asunafo North District, Asunafo South District, Asutifi North District, Asutifi South District.

The President of UT Holdings, Prince Kofi Amoabeng ask: "why closing down the bank".

The President of UT Holdings, Prince Kofi Amoabeng has said that he believes the defunct UT Bank which he founded could have survived if the Bank of Ghana had given them time to turn around its operations.

Mr. Amoabeng who admitted there were some challenges with the bank’s corporate governance structures, said there were other means to addressing the problem than closing down the bank.

Speaking on the KSM Show on Accra-based Metro Television, Mr. Amoabeng said the decision to close down the bank cost the country more.

The government found us in that situation, [but] was this the best route to take because we had investors who were ready with some proposals. They decide that the best thing is to close down UT Bank which I find really difficult to take but from where they are sitting, they decide that was the best thing for the country. I don’t bear grudges but the point is, if UT Bank we owed GH¢800 million and an investor comes and he says I’m ready to pay GH¢400 million so Bank of Ghana write off the [other] GH¢400 million, but BoG takes a decision to close down the bank which will cost the nation at least GH¢ 2.2 billion, it doesn’t make sense to me,” he said.

The President of UT Holdings, however, said he does not bear grudges over the situation, and the defunct bank takes responsibility for the failure of the financial institution.

“We had run our company down therefore we were vulnerable and therefore the government had to step in as it deemed fit….UT must take the blame first.”

On August 14, 2017, the bank of Ghana announced that it had revoked the license of UT Bank and that it was being taken over by GCB because it had a severe capital impairment.

Mr. Amoabeng who refrained from commenting about the development in a statement a year later expressed regret about the happenings surrounding the collapse of the bank and promised to cooperate with investigations into the collapse of the bank.

“More importantly to me today though, is the inability of several workers who once prided themselves as UT staff and now have little or nothing to show for their years of dedication and service; the negative impact on the other UT companies in the eyes of investors who believed in us and our vision to see a Ghanaian owned company become a successful global brand. I will continue to co-operate with all state agencies probing the development for finality to be brought to this matter,” he said and could’ve survived if BoG had given us time.