Akufo-Addo, Ofori-Atta’s cousin in conflict of interest in Frontier Health Services contract

Professor William Ampofo, a cousin of President Akufo-Addo and Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta has been found to have engaged in conflict of interest in the controversial Frontiers Healthcare Service contract.

A corruption risk assessment conducted by the Community Development Alliance has cited Professor Ampofo who is the head of Virology at the Noguchi Memorial Institute for conflict of interest.

The report sighted by GhanaWeb via MyJoyOnline states that Professor Ampofo ensured the validation of Frontiers Healthcare Services prior to the company being licensed by the Health Facilities Regulatory Agency

The report noted that Professor Ampofo was a local agent for the company but his presence had no value to effectiveness of the contract.

It stated that Professor Ampofo supervised the validation process for Frontiers at a time when the company had no staff and had to make use of staff at the Noguchi Memorial Institute where he serves as head of Virology.

“Dr. William Ampofo, Head of Virology at Noguchi Medical Research Institute (coincidentally a cousin of President Akufo-Addo and Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta) oversaw the validation processes for Frontiers Healthcare to begin the antigen tests at a time approval had not been secured, with Frontiers relying principally on the use of Noguchi staff,” the report revealed.

The report furthered that at the time of getting approval and agreement with Ghana Airports Company Limited, Frontiers Healthcare Services did not have the capacity conduct the Coronavirus testing at the Kotoka International Airport.

It stated that there were procurement breaches in the awarding of the contract to Frontiers.

The report recommended the publication of all contracts signed as well the beneficial ownership of all Covid-19 contracts.

The contract between GACL and Frontiers Health Services was one of the issues that dominated the vetting of some appointees of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.

The Minority side of the Appointments Committee kept probing until they had some response from the Minister of Transport.

Kweku Asiamah Ofori said during his vetting that “Sometime in July/August 2020, the President announced the Government’s inclination to reopen the borders of the nation to commercial air traffic, subject to the availability of an effective system for COVID-19 testing. Following this, Frontiers Healthcare Services Limited expressed the preparedness to provide such service to the public, whilst indicating that its equipment had been tested by the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA). The Ghana Airport Company Limited did not rely on the bare word of Frontiers Healthcare. It sought to verify and confirm the due certification of the equipment of Frontiers Healthcare. On 20th August 2020, the MD of GACL wrote to FDA to confirm the certification of Frontiers Healthcare.”