BNI man defrauds Ghanaian of ?80m?

The head of the Tema Municipal office of the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) is in the hands of police Criminal Investigations Division (CID) for allegedly defrauding a London-based Ghanaian of about ?80m.

Kwamina Afedzi, the officer, is alleged to have deceived one Emmanuel Kwesi Ananoo that he had a number of plots of land meant for sale in Accra and then collected the amount of 5850 pounds in tranches from the latter. By the end of 1997, the BNI officer had received all the amount.

The irony is that exposing criminals and fraudsters in this country forms part of the duties of the BNI of which Afedzie is a staff. The Ghanaian Chronicle learnt that Messrs Owusu Donkor, David Apeatu and Mohammed were the investigators handling the case, a fact Owusu Donkor confirmed when reached at the CID headquarters.

He however, declined to comment on it. “I know of the case but I will not allow you to land, please go and see Mr Amoah who is the head of this unit,” said Owusu Donkor.

Supt K.K. Amoah of Rapid Results Unit (RRU) at the police headquarters, confirmed that such a report had been made and said they “had gone far in their investigations,” and that not until they concluded, he could not disclose their findings. “In fact, the complainant, and a police officer went to the Lands Department for some report and we are yet to hear from them (Lands Dept). When receive the report, we can conclude our investigations,” said K.K. Amoah.

Ananoo had since followed the BNI boss with the hope of getting the said plots of land but all to no avail. He once led the victim to John Teye, near Accra but could not show him the land. Later, they went to Ofankor, Pokuase and Kasoa, all near Accra on the same mission but ended up in the same old story - false.

Ananoo has been in the country for the past seven months but Afedzi has not been able to fulfil his part of the contract. But for the vigilance of Ananoo, the BNI boss was going to sell government plots to him because all the pieces of land that he showed him during their rounds were not meant for sale.

“What we did was that we asked that an official from the Lands Department went with us to all those places, and in fact all the land he showed us belonged to the government, according to the records made available to us by the lands officer,” said Ananoo. “The national boss of BNI, Mr Amofa, is aware of this because I wanted him to assist me retrieve my money or get the piece of land,” he said.

The Ghanaian Chronicle, following this information went to the Tema Municipal office of the BNI, but Afedzi was not there for his comment. Later he asked one of his subordinates to call the paper’s office that he would come and see the editor last Friday 17 January but did not come. Telephone calls made subsequently could not yield any result.

When the paper wanted to talk to Amofa, it was asked to talk to one Adutwum at the BNI head office who also collected the Chronicle’s details and promised to arrange a meeting between the paper and Afedzi, for his version. As at the evening of Wednesday, nothing had been heard from them.