Asabee ‘Girl’ Captured

APPARENTLY executing a government ploy to hurl the hangman’s noose on the neck of former Information Minister Stephen Asamoah-Boateng, operatives of the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) yesterday arrested Yasmin Domua, his 24-year old sister-in-law and Marketing Executive of Plexiform Ventures.

Greyhounds of the BNI on Tuesday afternoon stormed the Tema Community 18 residence of Yasmin and after slugging it out with occupants of the house, bundled her and the mother into a vehicle and sped off with the two women.

Deputy Information Minister, Samuel Okudzeto-Ablakwa, has threatened that government may slap legal actions on Zuleka, Asamoah Boateng’s wife, over what he described as “obstructing justice” when she prevented BNI agents from seizing the passports of her husband and children last Sunday.

As at the time of Yasmin’s arrest and detention at the BNI, no charge had been leveled against her yet, but she was not allowed to speak to her lawyers though she insisted that she has a constitutional right to legal counsel.

Yasmin’s lawyer, John Ndebugre, who heard news about the arrest of his client and dashed down to the BNI, was turned away and prevented from setting eyes on her.

“I have been to the BNI but they would not allow me to see her with a lame excuse that the BNI director was not around and I waited for a while but I know their ways, so I advised the mother that we should leave the place and let them keep her for as long as the law would allow them to keep her.

“They claim they can keep somebody for 48-hours which is false because you can only talk about keeping somebody for 48-hours when you have effected an official arrest on the person. When they go and take people, they say they are inviting them and that they are not arresting them.

“I have told them that they are violating the right of the person and I would watch them for a while,” Mr. Ndebugre noted in an interview on the issue yesterday.

Plexiform Ventures, the company of which Asabee’s arrested sister-in-law is the Marketing Executive, in October last year won a GH¢86, 915.85 government contract to renovate parts of the Information Ministry.

The company completed the contract, had its final certificate after the work had been inspected by Supreme Procurement Agencies and was awaiting payment when the process was frozen by the Office of the President for reasons yet to be explained.

Reports are that someone from the corridors of power is alleging that Asamoah-Boateng had influenced the award of the said contract and thus, the BNI has been instructed to do a meticulous investigation into the allegations.

Already, Frank Agyekum, who signed the said contract in his capacity as Deputy Information Minister, has been ‘invited’ to the BNI and interrogated over the issue.

Agents from the bureau last Sunday ambushed Asabee, together with his wife and kids aged four and two, at the Kotoka International Airport and prevented them from boarding a British Airways flight to London.

The agents, who refused to disclose their identity cards, claimed Asabee could not travel because he was to report to the BNI the next day; they seized his passport and those of his family and he was neither told the reason for the invitation nor shown any arrest warrant.

The Acting Chief Director at the Ministry, D.A.Y. Sampong, apparently displeased over the issue, fired a letter to the Office of the President, asking that the Number One Citizen authorizes the release of funds for the payment of the contract because the Ministry went through “the necessary procurement processes to award the contract to M/S Plexiform Ventures”.

The Ag Chief Director added that “the Ministry was on the verge of issuing the cheque to the company when a directive was received from the office of the President that all payments should not be made prior to approval by the Office of the President.”

Interestingly, the contract was awarded only after it had gone through tender and the Ministry’s Entity Tender committee, of which Mr. Asamoah-Boateng was not a member, had accepted the Evaluation Report and unanimously agreed that out of the three companies that bid for the contract, Plexiform Ventures stood tall in aptitude, yet had the lowest price quotation and period to execute the contract.