The NPP Minority in Parliament last week in describing approval granted by the Bank of Ghana (BoG) for the sale of Merchant Bank Ghana Limited to Fortiz Equity Fund Limited as fraudulent and a scam, cunningly and maliciously mentioned Ibrahim Mahama, President John Mahama’s brother, as among those responsible for the failed bank’s bad debt.
Addressing a press conference in Parliament last Thursday, a member of the Finance Committee of Parliament and NPP MP for New Juaben South, Dr Mark Assibey-Yeboah, said this is a scam; a fraud being perpetuated on the Ghanaian people. How can you give your daughter for marriage before the marriage rites are performed?” he cried out.
According to the New Juaben South MP, “Even though no agreement has been signed between Fortiz and other shareholders, the BoG has gone ahead to give approval for the sale. He stated that due diligence had also not been done in the sale of Merchant Bank to Fortiz Equity Fund and challenged the Governor of the BoG to tell Ghanaians whether the assertion was right or not.
As it had been the case, ever since the troubles of the challenged state bank became public leading to its intended change of ownership, the opposition New Patriotic Party has never missed the opportunity to politicize and trivialize a matter which is purely corporate or, at best legal.
Although some NPP gurus and prominent party sympathizers together with Ibrahim Mahama’s company, Engineers and Planners, according to our investigations constitute the about 80 percent of defaulters of the distressed bank’s bad debt, the NPP conveniently and wickedly cited the debt owed by President Mahama’s brother’s company, Engineers and Planners, as the reason for the collapse of the Merchant Bank.
In justifying a charge of fraud and a scam in the sale of Merchant bank to Fortiz and in order to draw the president’s brother into the fray, and by extension, President Mahama, (and this is not the first time) NPP MP for New Juaben South, Dr Mark Assibey-Yeboah at the press conference last week stated “…Whereas the sticking point in the rejection of the FRB deal was how to deal with the bad books, we are quick to accept this bogus offer that only seeks to collect a paltry 30 percent of the bad books and hand over 70 percent to SSNIT, including the Ghc58 million owed by Ibrahim Mahama’s Engineers and Planners,” he said.
What the minority failed and or, refused to tell Ghanaians was that companies belonging to some of its influential members, supporters and financiers including Appiah Menka of Apino Soap fame, Myroc Food Processing Company Limited, Western Steel owned by Mr. Tamakloe, Kinsman Enterprise and Seth Dovlo among others, are also part of the huge debtors of the failed Merchant bank. We shall be publishing the full list in due course.
Well, the good and bad news for the opposition NPP, this paper’s investigations can reveal is that, but for some strange reasons coupled with ‘misunderstanding’ between the immediate past board of directors of the Merchant bank and Mr. Ibrahim, the first Ghanaian to fly a private jet, who has since added a second; the indebtedness of Engineers and Planners at the bank would have long been amortized.
Our further investigation indicates that due to Engineers and Planners current viability, potential financial mettle and positive outlook, the company has since the middle of last year secured and won the backing of a foreign financial institution which has undertaken to under-write its obligation to Merchant bank which is likely to happen before the end of this year.
Mr. Ibrahim Mahama’s Engineers and Planners Company Ltd, a wholly Ghanaian owned company specializes in the management and hiring of heavy duty plants, equipment and machinery, haulage, oil and gas, land reclamation and restoration, dam construction and mining; has been in operation for over 16 year and it is presently operating in five countries: Ghana, Liberia, Republic of Guinea, Sierra Leon and Congo Brazzaville and hope to expand further to the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mauritania and the Gulf region.
