Baffour-Awuah & Associates & The NPP Connection

HOW CONSPIRACY AGAINST MUMUNI WAS HATCHED

… Hints of His Choice as NDC Running-Mate in 2004 Started it All

We have been very silent on the brouhaha surrounding the nomination and vetting of Alhaji Mohammed Mumuni as the Minister designate for the Foreign Affairs Ministry. The fine gentleman and legal juggernaut from the Northern Region of Ghana has been long targeted by the NPP for destruction. True Democrat intelligence revealed that ever since Alhaji Mumuni’s name started popping-up on the NPP security radar as possible running-mate to the then candidate Atta Mills in 2004, a plot was hatched to use every means possible to discredit him and jeopardize his political career.

With the signs clearly on the wall that Mumuni was being considered for the number two slot of the NDC in 2004, the then NPP government quickly ordered their favourite audit firm to institute forensic audit into the activities of the Ministry of Employment and Manpower Development. We are informed that they then ordered the Auditor-General to give it legal backing so they’ll be seen as the ones who authorized the firm to carry out the audit. True to form, the firm came out with some allegations of losses having been incurred at the Vocational Training Sector. Like other audits carried out by Baffour-Awuah and Associates, not less than $350, 000 was paid to the Accounting Firm.

We can confirm that the agenda to jettison Mumuni’s political life was discussed at a very high level of the NPP cabal in the Castle at the time. Since taking over the reins of government in 2001, the NPP decided to institute forensic audits into selected sectors of the economy under the NDC. In pursuing this ‘evil agenda’, the NPP managed to get a willing tool in the name of Baffour-Awuah & Associates to conduct forensic audits into the activities of certain persons and organizations. For the first time in many years, this audit firm became a household name in accounting circles, with huge sums of money being doled out to them for the so-called forensic audits.

As explained by our intelligence, the whole saga to nail Alhaji Mumuni started with the alleged break-in at the Ministry of Employment under Mr. Yaw Barimah. There were allegations of attempted removal of confidential information from the system at the Ministry. The plot was to prevent Alhaji Mumuni from getting access to vital information which was likely to expose the sloppy if not the partisan-agenda auditing carried out by the NPP preferred auditing firm, Baffour-Awuah & Associates. The break-in, into Yaw Barimah’s office followed the official request by Mumuni to his then colleague Member of Parliament to be furnished with all the documents relating to the Vocational Training Sector being alluded to by the so-called Baffour-Awuah & Associates forensic audit report.

What was strange and bizarre about the Mumuni saga was the inability of the security operatives to trace the culprits of the break-in. As we write, not a single soul has been apprehended by the security agents under the NPP let alone for a thorough investigation to be instituted into the matter. The general view of those who followed the story was that the NPP security operatives were actually sent on that mission to clean the hard drive system of all relevant information concerning the issue and to remove all documents which had the potential to exonerate Mumuni. In short, it was an inside job well conceived and executed by the NPP cabal which then had untrammeled power and authority to do anything under the sun in this country. Since the NDC lost the 2004 elections with the man at the centre of the current storm, Mumuni unfortunately getting injured in a fatal accident after his nomination as Atta Mills’ running-mate, the NPP government’s interest in the matter died a natural death.

Our intelligence also noted that in a typical case of job for the boys, the NPP government had been quick to direct the Controller and Accountant-General to pay Baffour Awuah & Associates for work done. No where have we been informed that the auditors, that is, Baffour-Awuah & Associates have conducted their forensic audit and came out with no adverse findings under the NPP administration. The preference for this firm by the Auditor-General to the detriment of his own staff some of whom have had longer professional experience raised a lot of eyebrows. As noted by the intelligence, some of the staff of the Audit Service had been auditing United Nations Accounts for close to twenty-five years but when it came to auditing some of the sectors under the NDC administration, a very clever tactic was almost always adopted to get Baffour Awuah & Associates.

Strangely, we had a twist in the case of the School Feeding Programme with the Auditor-General very loud in quoting constitutional provisions and dismissing the authenticity of the Price Water House Audit Report into the activities of Dr. Amoako Tuffuor and his team. Unlike the NPP Government preferred Baffour-Awuah & Associates, Price Water House was selected because of the donor input into the feeding programme. Clearly, the game-plan to manipulate and get desired results was out of the question hence the scandal of scandals which pushed the Auditor-General to run in circles, whining and hissing like a snake for being ignored in the scheme of things as far as the constitutional provisions were concerned.