Turf war over Destination Inspection booty

• “copy masters” (Bankswitch) in the centre of ruckus

By: Justice Lee Adoboe

Financial Intelligence (FI) investigations have stumbled upon the fact that the whole brouhaha that has characterized the import processing sector lately in the country is just a turf war being fueled by a new entrant to stalk and take-over the market from existing operators.

Currently Destination Inspection is a very lucrative business with operators numbering only four in the country. These are Bivac, Gateway Services Ltd, Ghanalink and Inspection Control Services (ICS).

These companies charge as much as 1% of the Cost Freight and Insurance (CFI) value of every consignment they inspect for government, with the tonnes of import consignments entering Ghana’s ports, increasing by the day.

It is estimated that these Destination Inspection Companies (DICs) make over $70 million apiece annually.

This is where a company, which first entered into Ghana in 2006 with the intent of doing what they termed, Secure Documents for government, is now fighting tooth and nail to take over all businesses relating to import clearance in the country.

Bankswitch, according to information available to FI, having failed to convince Bank of Ghana to be allowed to do the Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement System, then presented proposals to government in 2006 to be allowed to do Secured Document.

According to our sources, that proposal also allegedly failed to yield results since it was realised that there was no way that system would work in Ghana, as the process Ghanaian importers used in shipping their goods was not so conventional.

The system, for instance involves going to every supply source in Europe, America and Asia where Ghanaian traders purchase goods to check the authenticity of the receipts and invoices, while Customs wait for their results to process these goods for import duties.

“The company then went ahead to present another proposal to government to be allowed to perform the services GCNet has already been carrying out for the Customs Excise and Preventive Service (CEPS),” our source alleged.

In desperation, Bankswitch is alleged to have copied even the logo of GCNet on their documents presented to government to show their expertise.

When GCNet complained about this to government, and also the fact that government had breached confidences by giving out their documents to a competitor, Bankswitch tried to modify the logo, which still looks like the GCNet logo.

Government, trying to test the viability of what Bankswitch and their partner, the Get Group were touting, sent a delegation with the Bankswitch team to Dubai, where company claimed to have deployed such equipment.

According to a report presented by Walace Akondor, currently chief collector of CEPS at the Tema Port, the system they were made to see was just like what GCNet has been operating in Ghana.

The Akondor report however stated that the group was unable to see a demonstration of the valuation module Bankswitch promised. This, a member of the delegation said “was a diplomatic way of saying it did not exist.”

It was however found out by Ghana government officials that the system Bankswitch and their technical partners were trying to hoodwink government with was actually built by Dubai World not Bankswitch or the Get Group.

Interestingly, after hanging around for the whole of 2007, Bankswitch allegedly managed to get Ghana government to sign a contract with them. “But this contract was signed on Easter Monday, a public holiday with Dr Anthony Akoto Osei, signing for Ghana Government.

At this time, Bankswitch also started lobbying to do Destination Inspection for the country.

By November 2008, government was allegedly misled to part with $600,000 to Bankswitch for a job they purportedly did in identifying revenue leakage. It was alleged that the work for which Bankswitch was paid was work actually done by the Revenue Protection Unit of the then Revenue Agencies Management Board with support from GCNet officials

Bankswitch is alleged to be lobbying at the highest decision making place in Ghana to be allowed to replace GCNet and also replace all the Destination Inspection companies in Ghana.

Meanwhile in their April 2010 bulletin, the Investment Climate advisory Services of the World Bank gave high marks to the reforms that have taken place in Ghana’s Transit Management system which is done in collaboration with GCNet.