CAN2008 Debt is NPP Mess

Nepotism, lawlessness and stupidity of Kufuor and Crats, rob Ghana and stockpile needless debts.

In less than two months, it would be legally impossible for anyone to institute legal action against Mr. John Agyekum Kufuor, the two terms Ex-President of the Republic of Ghana in respect of anything done or omitted to be done by him in his personal capacity before or during his term of office (Article 57 (6) 1992 constitution).

He would have successfully be deemed as a former president, whose hands are clean as far as corruption or maladministration is concerned, even as records of his eight years rule suggest that, the man had little or no respect for rule of law which ought to have been the bedrock of good-governance in the country.

Among Gh267 million judgment debts settlements recorded by the Auditor General’s Department, is a GH 41,811,480.59 incurred by the state as a result of crass ineptitude, gross indiscipline and abuse of due process by the J.A Kufuor’s regime in the award of Stadia renovations and constructions prior to the CAN 2008 hosting by Ghana.

The Auditor General has recommended that to save the State from incurring such avoidable expenditure, I recommended that any public officer, whose negligence leads to the imposition of debt on the State, should be surcharged accordingly.

The blatant abuse of power by the lurking Ex-President did not only leave the state in debts but also deny the country an opportunity to speed up its development.

President Kufuor and his entire cabinet could be held responsible for this particular debt which was avoidable had he not decided to subvert the rule of law in pursuit of political vindictiveness.

Contrary to John Agyekum Kufuor’s aversion that he has rather saved the country millions of Ghana Cedis as a result of the wrongful award of contract to a Chinese construction company, documents cited by the Republic reveals otherwise; the president and his men arbitrarily abrogated contracts of financial engineering and stadia construction entered through due process and rewarded same to the Chinese company without recourse to due process.

Documents available to The Republic Newspaper (TRN) reveals that the crass abuse of power by Kufuor has saddled the state with judgment debts amounting to more than a GH100 Million Ghana Cedis.

In respect of the Gh41,811,480.59 judgment debts recorded in the Report of the Auditor-General on the Public Accounts of Ghana(Consolidated Fund) for the year ended 31 December 2010, Mr. Alfred Woyome, a stout member of the National Democratic Congress has claimed that after the nation won the bid for the right to organise and host the 2nd MTN Africa Cup of Nations, he partnered a consortium named Waterville which successfully bid and was awarded the contract for the construction of five new stadia and rehabilitation of the Ohene Djan, Baba Yara and El Wak Sports Stadia which contract was signed on 26th April 2006 between Waterville and the Ghana Government.

Prior to the awarding of the stadia construction and renovations, Mr. Woyome who is a professional finance engineer was assigned by the Kufuor administration to negotiate credit facility on behalf of the state in relation to the hosting of CAN 2008.

In a letter sighted by this paper, Hon. Kweku Agyeman-Manu, Deputy Minister of Finance under the NPP administration wrote endorsing Mr. A. Agbesi Woyome; “this Ministry is aware of a meeting going to take place between yourselves on one part, and Mr. Alfred Woyome and Vamed Engineering GmbH &Co. KG. on the other part, about a concessional loan for the attached projects, proposed by Vamed Engineering GmbH & Co. KG. to the Government”

The letter continued, “we wished to state thus, Vamed Engineering GmbH &Co. KG. and Mr. Alfred Agbesi Woyome should be assisted to conclude the loan deal and a term sheet presented to this Ministry for Consideration” Vamed Engineering GmbH &Co. KG later transferred its authorities to Waterville the consortium named above.

As a result of the arrangement Alfred Woyome went on to negotiate and arrange through Bank Austria Creditanstalt, a total amount of €1,106,470,587.00 for the stadia projects which included provision for a state of the art stadia in all 10 regions of Ghana in addition to a construction of six hospitals and a cobalt 60 plant and tissue culture project.

The facility also included a grand plan to construct a 60,000-seater, Olympics-size stadium in Accra.

Prior to making the said credit facility available for the tournament, an evaluation team appointed by the Ministry of Finance had adjudged the finance offer from Bank Austria Creditanstalt arranged by Waterville consortium as the most competitive and thus recommended their offer to the Government of Ghana

In spite of the fact that Waterville consortium won the contract, for the stadia works in accordance with the laid down procedure and law with concurrent approval by the Central Tender Review Board and had started same, per a letter in August 2005, the Ministry of Education Youth and Sports, unilaterally abrogated the contract and later re-awarded same to other contractors after Kufuor became suspicious of Alfred Woyome’s relationship with the then opposition elements.

Mr. JA Kufuor noted for his political vindictiveness, instructed his officials to abrogate the decision by the central tender committee, a body made up of financial experts and competent engineers mandated to conduct due diligence on contracts of such magnitude and rewarded the contract to a relatively unknown Chinese Company.

It turned out that, the Chinese Company which eventually undertook the stadia renovation and construction project did not even go through any bidding process, but was rather handed the contract in a very obscure manner.

Secret US cables made available by Wikileaks early this year, revealed that the award of the contract was subdued with blatant abuse of due process. According to the cable the NPP government “disregarded the results of international tender tentatively awarded to Austrian company Waterville, with links to U.S. and UK Company”,

In an interview with Osafo Marfo, The Republic learnt that former President Kufuor maliciously swapped the deal in favour to sign a cheaper sole sourcing deal, with an unknown Chinese company without any due diligence.

According to Dr. Osarfo Marfo, “everyone agreed that after due diligence and technical assessment of seventy applications, VAMED was the best hit among the firms which bided for the contract for the construction and rehabilitation of the stadia. Obviously, his Excellency President Kufuor had no interest or respect for the laid down procurement and tender procedure that guided the decision of the technical committees mandated to execute the contract. “Of all the bids by the seventy firms, VAMED topped in all the categories and would have brought a better value for money.”

In his unnerving response to the catalogue of thug-waging allegations of corruption and gross impropriety against his government in the famous Wikileaks confidential diplomatic cable drops, John Agyekum Kufuor, the former President, attempted to employ public relations gimmicks to brush off the accusations.

Initially after the termination and after persistent threat of legal actions the government agreed to retain Waterville Holdings for the rehabilitation of 3 of the stadia namely the Ohene Djan, Accra, Baba Yara, Kumasi and El Wak, Accra.

After arbitrarily abrogating the contract together with the Austrian Credit Facility which rather had a concessionary advantage of 9 percent grant, the government went for a commercial loan including loans from the Barclays Bank of Ghana at a high interest rate.

Later in August 2006, the Attorney General also wrote to terminate the contracts for the three stadia Ohene Djan,Accra, Baba Yara, Kumasi and El Wak, Accra as well and re-awarded them to other contractors following elaborate investigation by the government on the track-record of Mr. Alfred Woyome of which they concluded he was not a sympathizer of the regime.

In a claim made to the Commercial Division of the High Court by Mr. Woyome, underscored that prior to the formal award and signing of the contractual documents, due to time constraints, the various sites for the project were earlier handed to the consortium, Waterville on the 6th day of February 2006 on the strength of a letter from the Ministry of Education and Sports.

John Kufuor has told Paul Adom Otchere on a Metro TV that he “personally rejected the results of the stadium tender, because VAMED’s winning bid was far well over $300 million, and that he had acted in the interest of the Ghanaian public”.

Mr. Osafo Marfo disclosed that even after technical evaluation by the competent tender board, the VAMED offer was better comparing with the Chinese one that his President single handed picked and gave the contract to.

According to a cabinet memorandum by the Minister for Education and Sports on the subject “report on the procurement of works (Stadia) for CAN 2008 sighted by the Republic, “following the award of the right to host CAN 2008, invitation to tenders to express interest in the procurement of Goods, Works and Services was published on 6th January, 2005 and procurement process has been followed in accordance with Public Procurement Act, 2003, Act 663, for the past seven months”.

The Enquirer Newspaper Report in September 2005

SCANDAL ROCKS (part 1 ) CAN 2008

...Chinese company was disqualified

...Central Tender Review Board gives "concurrent approval' to tender winners ....But Govt. bent on dealing with Chinese

The CAN 2008 project is suffocating under huge controversies with accusations that government is cat

walking on a boring and naked violation of the Procurement Act through the circumvention of a seven month tender process which hit completion stage this month.

Further investigations indicate that during the last month the tender process, a leading member of the CAN2008 LOC secretly wrote to the Sports Ministry to submit a proposal from Shanghai Construction Group, but the Ministry rejected the request, saying that it was in contravention of the Procurement Act.

Credible information suggests that at the time the leading LOC member was trying to lobby for the Chinese company, the tender evaluation had already been completed. According to sources at the Ministry of Sports arid Bank of Ghana, the Ministry told the leading LOC member that his request to consider the Shanghai Construction Group, apart from violating the Procurement Act also meant that the tender process had to be extended for another three months which could affect the chances of Ghana meeting the Confederation of African Football (CAF) deadline.

Impeccable sources have said that the Ministry also rejected the Shanghai Construction Group on the grounds that their inclusion in the tender in the seventh month would negate the meticulous process of the tender.

The Enquirer also uncovered that the e same LOC official who wrote the letter to the Sports Ministry also wrote to Confederation of African Football (CAF) to ask the august sporting organization to allow Ghana to reduce the stadia capacity, but CAF refused. CAF told the LOC Capo that the terms of reference of the tournament must be fulfilled by any country which wants to host the tournament.

MORE REVELATIONS

The Enquirer's investigations indicate that days before Spoils Minister, Osafo Maafo. and CAN 2008 LOC Chairman traveled to China to bring Shanghai Construction Group, the Central Tender Review Board which is mandated under the Procurement Act to approve the award of contracts had, after a seven month long bidding process, given 'concurrent approval' for the award of the CAN 2008 stadia construction and rehahilit2tion to a consortium called Waterville/VAMED.

A spokesperson for Waterville/VAMED in Washington, DC (USA) has indicated that the cost of financial engineering for the consortium's participation in the tender process up to this stage is in the range of about 4.2 million Euros

The Spokesperson added that feasibility studies which includes soil tests at sites earmarked for the stadia construction as well as detailed designs for the various stadia also cost them over three million Euros.

The approval for the award of contract to the Consortium from the Central Tender Review Board which was intercepted by The Enquirer, has been allegedly hijacked by some Government officials, and kept in a safe vault to prevent it from leaking into the public domain.

According to documents sighted by The Enquirer, the Central Tender Review Board in coming to their decision to approve the award of contract to the said consortium commended the Ministry of Sports and Education for a good evaluation which was done twice to ensure that the evaluation process was watertight.

The controversies regarding the CAN 2008 project hit its zenith last week when Education and Sports Minister, Yaw Osafo Maafo and the CAN2008 LOC Chairman, Dr. Kofi Amoah, led a three-member delegation to China to negotiate with Shanghai Construction Group, the Chinese company which was rejected by the same Ministry.

Legal experts say the decision of the government to set aside a seven month tender process which involved over 244 companies, is a clear violation of the Procurement Act which requires that contracts of this magnitude must go though competitive bidding.

FIVE DAYS LATER

Five days after the Central Tender Review Board gave concurrent approval for the award of contract to Waterville/VAMED, the Ghana Embassy in China was instructed to furnish the CAN 2008 LOC with particulars of Shanghai Construction Group.

The Ghana Embassy letter which was dated August 11, 2005, was addressed to Dr. Kofi Amoah, gave the details of the contact person for Shanghai Construction Group as Mr. Jiang Yi Bo, General Manager-Overseas Business Department.

EXPLANATIONS

Meanwhile, Dr. Kofi Amoah, Chairman of the CAN2008 Local Organizing Committee (LOC) who has no locus under the Procurement Act, has explained that government realized that bids submitted by the various companies who participated in the tender is much higher than what the Chinese who were not part of the tender process are offering. Even though experts say the Minister for Sports has no right under the Procurement Act to nullify a procurement process, some LOC officials told The Enquirer, under the procurement Act, that the Minister seems to possess certain powers provided by 'certain powers' to nullify the procurement process.

Dr. Kofi Amoah, the LOC Chairman who has assumed center stage of the process, has been quoted as saying: "This process took us seven months, at the end of the period companies that made the shortlist, it became quite obvious that sums and prices that they were talking about is not something that is within the interest of government in terms of

magnitude, so obviously, the results of the procurement process was given to government to take a look.

"But at the same time when we knew that the initial figures were too high. We had to start looking elsewhere"

The LOU Chairman, has also been quoted as saying: It was common knowledge that the Chinese usually have good price quality ratio. So it was decided that there is a stadium in Shanghai that we should visit and check out their references"

Dr. Amoah further noted that before he and Spouts Minister left for China, the Chinese Company was invited to Ghana to have discussions (behind the Tender process) and that the price they were talking about seemed interesting.

The LOC Chairman was quoted by Joy Fm as saying the information About the Chinese was given to the President at a Cabinet meeting before a final decision was taken.

"This country could not afford the other prices•"

that other companies were quoting