Flashback: I don’t hate Kufuor and Akufo-Addo - Tsatsu Tsikata

In the lead up to the 2016 Elections, the former Chief Executive of Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), Tsatsu Tsikata, told Ghanaians that he did not harbour any form of hate for ex-President John Agyekum Kufuor’s administration and then-Attorney General, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.

Tsatsu Tsikata was convicted by the High Court in Accra on June 18, 2008 for willfully causing financial loss to the state as CEO of GNPC.

The staunch NDC member was later released despite rejecting former President Kufour’s presidential pardon.

On November 29, 2016, the Court of Appeal overturned the High Court judgment which sentenced the former GNPC boss into five years imprisonment, because Mr. Tsikata was not given a “fair opportunity to defend himself”.

When the astute lawyer who led the NDC to win the 2013 Election Petition had the opportunity to speak to the media after the Court of Appeal ruling he said, “I am not bitter about the conviction and nobody should think of me in terms of bitterness.”

Mr. Tsikata however noted that he never had the opportunity to exchange pleasantries with Akufo-Addo as he did with J.A Kufuor in an airplane after he was released.

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Former Chief Executive of Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), Tsatsu Tsikata says although he was wrongly convicted under former President John Kufuor’s administration, he harbours no bitterness against him nor the then-Attorney General Nana Akufo-Addo.

“I am not bitter about the conviction and nobody should think of me in terms of bitterness”, Mr. Tsikata told Onua FM’s Ghana Dadwene on Thursday.

A High Court in Accra convicted the former GNPC boss on June 18, 2008 for willfully causing financial loss to the state.

Months into the conviction, former President Kufour granted him a presidential pardon, which he rejected.

The Court of Appeal on Tuesday November 29, 2016, overturned the High Court judgment which sentenced the former GNPC boss into five years imprisonment, saying, “the judgment of the High Court was a miscarriage of justice, because it did not give Mr. Tsikata a fair opportunity to defend himself”.

Asked if he ever met former President Kufuor or Nana Akufo-Addo after he was jailed, Mr. Tsikata said “I met former President Kufor in a plane and we shared greetings together but I have never met Nana Addo after my release”.

He however recalled, “I saw him [Nana Addo] in court during the election petition 2012 but that was during the proceedings and that was all but I don’t arbor any bitterness against them”.



File for compensation

Mr. Tsatsu Tsika spoke about the possibility of him filing for compensation. “We shall consider if we have to file for compensation because the constitution permit me to file for compensation. My lawyer had to travel moment after the ruling so when he comes we shall think about it. We shall think about the compensation”.

Mr. Tsikata announced that any compensation would be used to help the inmates of Nsawam Prisons because “Nsawam was another faculty for me. I learnt a lot of the things that prisoners go through there so if there is any compensation, I will use to help the prisons”. Wish to be president?

“I don’t wish to be president. I believe God has been good to me and I want the younger ones to go for that. I don’t have that energy for campaigns and I believe if you say this again, my wife will not allow me come here again,” he remarked.