Cecilia Dapaah's claim of GH¢132,000 being her sitting allowance raises suspicion - OSP

The Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) says the embattled former Minister of Sanitation and Water Resources, Cecilia Abena Dapaah‘s claim that the amount of GH¢132,000 being part of monies collected from her Abelemkpe residence was her sitting allowance raises suspicion.

The Office said she has been unable to justify the legitimacy of the cash discovered at the residence.

According to the OSP, various amounts were found stashed in 32 different envelopes, totaling GH¢132,007, and she claimed it was her sitting allowances.

“A record of the various sums sealed in said envelopes range from Four Hundred cedis (GH¢400.00) to Thirty-Eight Thousand One Hundred and Sixty cedis (GH¢38,160.00), most of which far exceed the approved sums recommended for payment to public officials as sitting allowances – raising suspicion as to the legitimacy of their sources,” the OSP stated in its fact sheet on Tuesday, September 19, 2023.

It said Madam Dapaah’s husband had earlier indicated that his niece remitted money to him from the US for purposes of construction.

“However, the identified niece was unable to provide evidence of the source of the said amounts and evidence of lawful remittance of said sums to the second respondent,” OSP’s fact sheet noted.

“Whereupon she claimed to have personally and physically brought the said sums purportedly amounting to Two Hundred Thousand United States dollars (US$ 200,000.00) without lawful declaration.”

According to the OSP, the application to have Madam Abena Dapaah’s accounts and property frozen must be granted.

“On this score, the applicant has demonstrated beyond satisfaction from the foregoing that the first respondent, whose bank accounts and investments are under a freezing order, is being investigated for corruption and corruption-related offenses including using public office for profit as deposed in paragraph 6 above and that the frozen property is liable to be confiscated should it be subsequently established as tainted property.”

The OSP further revealed that there are several suspicious transactions running through the bank accounts and investments of Madam Abena Dapaah “and other transactions which cannot be attributed to her lawful income and her declared or disclosed sources of income at all material times in her position as a public officer”.