I Fear Prison – Konadu Rawlings

Former First Lady and President of the 31st December Women’s Movement (DWM), Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, yesterday took strong exception to a description that she had taken a desperate move to get out of the legal quagmire she had found herself in. Rather, she was only fighting against going to prison.To underscore the fear she attached to going to prison, she asked her interviewer on a Citi FM programme whether he would want his mother to go to prison.

Virtually signaling her un-preparedness to go to jail, Nana Konadu, who had on previous radio programmes boasted she wasn’t afraid to go to jail, asked the interviewer to put himself in her shoes to see determine whether it was that easy to be charged with ‘30 trumped up criminal charges.’ She took offence to a suggestion that her recent trips abroad to present her on-going court cases to the international community were desperate moves, more so when she had not yet exhausted available local remedies, but insinuated she would fight tooth and nail to save her skin.

According to her, it was all meant to save her name and family because she believed she had stolen nothing.During the interview, which dealt mainly with the latest information that fresh charges would be preferred against her in connection with the criminal divestiture of GIHOC Nsawam Cannery to Caridem Development Company, the investment arm of the 31st December Women Movement (DWM), the President of the movement said there was no desperation in her attempts to extricate herself from the charges.

The Acting Director of Public Prosecution, Ms. Getrude Aikins had told the Fast Track High Court trying Mrs. Rawlings and five others that nine fresh charges would be proffered against the accused persons on Friday instead of the 30, when the court resumed sitting.She however fell short of giving insight into the fresh charges.Reacting to the new development, the former First Lady said she doubted if the alleged reduction of charges from 30 to 9 would be different, saying she suspected it was a mere compression of the original 30 criminal charges. “It is not anything fresh. It had been one year, three months now, and suddenly you sleep and dream and come out with nine charges. It is the same thing they are going to play around, but we will get to know by Friday,” she said.

According to her, what was happening in the courtroom was an attempt to disgrace and embarrass her.Asked why she had been junketing for support across the globe, armed with the charge sheet, she said she had to take necessary and precautionary measures to save herself and family at home. Mrs. Rawlings is being tried along with Hanny Sherry Ayittey, Managing Director of Caridem, Thomas Benson Owusu, an accountant, Emmanuel Agbodo, former Executive Secretary of the Divestiture Implementation Committee (DIC) and Kwame Peprah, former Minister of Finance and Economic Planning and Chairman of DIC.

The charges against them include conspiracy to commit crime, causing financial loss to the state in the divestiture of Nsawam Cannery to Caridem, intentionally causing harm to public property and obtaining public property by false pretence.Nana Konadu has already complained that the numerous court cases she was facing had disabled her and become her main preoccupation. She accused government of using the judiciary to muzzle her, citing her political disagreements with the government of the day.