Dr Barnafo gave me cheque for C800m - Witness

Madam Georgina Okaiteye, Member of the 31st December Women's Movement (DWM), told an Accra Fast Track Court on Tuesday that the movement received 800 million cedis from Societe Industrielle Plantation Hevea (SIPH) for assisting it to win the bid for the Ghana Rubber Estates Limited (GREL).

Testifying under cross-examination in the GREL divestiture case, Madam Okaiteye said Dr Albert Owusu-Barnafo, a consultant of GREL, gave her cheque.

Four persons are standing trial in the case in which the 31st DWM allegedly used its influence on the Divestiture Implementation Committee (DIC) Board to divest GREL to SIPH, a French company.

The four are alleged to have involved themselves in bribery and corrupt practices in the course of GREL's privatisation.

They are Hanny Sherry Ayittey, Treasurer of DWM, Emmanuel Amuzu Agbodo, former Executive Secretary of DIC, Ralph Casely-Hayford, a Businessman and Sati Dorcas Ocran, a Housewife.

They have all denied the charges and the trial judge, Mr Justice J. C. Amonoo-Monney, an Appeal Court Judge with an additional responsibility as a High Court Judge, has granted each of them a self-recognisance bail. Madam Okaiteye told the court that when Dr Owusu-Barnafo handed over the cheques to her, he said it was SIPH's appreciation to DWM for assisting it to win the bid for GREL.

Witness disagreed with a suggestion by Mr David Lamptey, counsel for Ayittey, that the face value of those cheques was 850 million cedis.

She disagreed with another suggestion by counsel that Dr Owusu-Barnafo issued the cheques based on some invoices she Madam Okaiteye initialled.

Witness told the court that she could not remember ever signing those invoices, saying, "I have been signing other documents of that nature."

Asked why she did not put the money straight into the movement's accounts, Madam Okaiteye said that was not the agreement she reached with Dr Owusu-Barnafo.

Witness said she first paid the money into her own account and later withdrew it for Dr Owusu-Barnafo.

Witness disagreed with a suggestion by counsel that the face value of the money when Dr Owusu-Barnafo gave it back to her was now 1.5 billion cedis, and it was never true that she lodged the difference in her Bank for Housing and Construction (BHC) account.

The case has been adjourned to Wednesday, March 12, for further cross-examination of witness.