Agyapa Deal: Ghana has made more than $500m for the share you were selling forever – Ben Boakye

The Executive Director of the Africa Centre for Energy Policy has clapped back at Gabby Otchere Darko over his “rants” about the legitimacy of the Agyapa Royalties deal.

According to Ben Boakye, the deal was going to short-change the country through the sale of as much as 49% of shares.

Gabby, in a post on August 15, recounted the fact that there was no corruption involved as far as the Agyapa deal was concerned.

According to him, despite the controversies surrounding the deal, “Agyapa, a very legitimate, even if controversial, move by govt to expand the use of its gold revenues, had no corruption about it. Zero! You may not like it but to say, as they did, that a group of related persons were stealing Ghana’s gold was really sad and low. We the lawyers who worked on it were excited about the innovativeness of the whole MIIF institution which Parliament created and the things it was set up to do, including Agyapa.”

In a post on August 15, Ben Boakye replied with the following nine pointers:

1. It's not every CSO against Agyapa that was in court.

2. The court would not know that the same lawyers that cooked the MIIF Act were the lawyers behind Agyapa.

3. Parliament that passed the MIIF act could not anticipate the trickery in the eventual sale of 49% of royalty

4. You were selling 49% of gold royalties forever, valued at $500m.

5. Since the aborted efforts, Ghana has made more than $500m for the share you were selling forever.

6. There are about 5 pipeline projects that would’ve been part of the transaction to benefit the investors.

7. The pipeline project will generate about $200m annually. It would have been shared with the investors.

8. You committed to locking the royalty regime at 5%, selling the sovereignty of Ghana to regulate its fiscal take in the future,

9. CSOs doubt that these risks were not known.

SSD/DAG

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