GYEEDA Scandal: I won’t go down alone - Minister warns

The ongoing prosecution of individuals whose actions and inactions allegedly contributed to the massive rot at the Ghana Youth and Entrepreneurial Development Agency (GYEEDA) has assumed a very revealing twist as the immediate past Youth and Sports Minister and now Minister of Agriculture, Mr. Clement Kofi Humado, is alleged to have threatened “not to go down alone” if an attempt is made to sacrifice him.

The NDC Member of Parliament for Anlo, under whose tenure as Youth and Sports Minister most of the GYEEDA controversial contracts were signed, as per revelations by a Ministerial Assessment Committee’s report, is been cited by many for prosecution.


The Ministerial Assessment Committee report indicted him and others of financial misconduct, but the minister is said to have vowed that any attempt at ‘sacrificing’ him for political expediency will spell doom for the ruling National Democratic Congress.


Information reaching The Al-Hajj has it that even before the prosecution of the former National Coordinator of GYEEDA and MP for Chiana-Paga, Mr Abuga Pele began, the embattled Agric Minister has been complaining to friends and relations that he has picked intelligence the NDC government intends to use him as a scapegoat to cleanse the system in demonstrating government’s commitment to fighting corruption.


But the Minister, according to our reliable source close to him, is stiffly standing his grounds and threatens Armageddon should the government dare carry out any such plan.


Already, the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, on the orders of President John Mahama, have begun the prosecution of the former GYEEDA National Coordinator, Mr Abuga Pele, and Chief Executive Officer of Goodwill International Group, Philip Akpeena Assibit.

The two are currently facing 19 criminal charges related to fraudulent contracts awarded some private Service Providers.


Mr Pele who had initially also lamented of attempts to use him as a scapegoat even before his prosecution started last week, has since declared his innocence and has said he would be surprised if the NDC intends to sacrifice him.


Speaking on Adom FM on Monday, Mr. Abuga Pele opined that “People make it look like I am corrupt. They have judged and condemned me”.


Adding that “I will be shocked if they sacrifice me…I have worked so hard for this party (National Democratic Congress, NDC) while in opposition…I have sacrificed for this party. So why would they use me as a scapegoat?


“I have done nothing wrong for them to sacrifice me. What I know is that, Ghanaians are calling for the truth; they are not calling for a sacrificial lamb.”

Before this statement, Mr Abuga had stated on a number of networks that "I have heard that they want to use me to cleanse the system, so if they sacrifice me, everybody would believe that the government is indeed fighting corruption."


Attempts by this paper to speak to Mr Kofi Humado, who is also insisting on his innocence proved futile by press time yesterday.


GYEEDA has become an unwanted albatross around the neck of the Mahama government, as a ministerial report indicted several government appointees and Ministers of both the Kufuor and Atta Mills/Mahama administrations for complicity.