Mabey and Johnson: Another Test Case for President Mills.

Our media in recent times have been grossly dominated with the famous Mabey and Johnson case. Mabey and Johnson, a British International Company that conducts business all over the world, had been dealing with various government agencies and departments. The company under new managers went to court to take a look at the operations and awards of contracts by their predecessor and it came out that, the company in bidding for contracts all over, gave some monies to influential people in the various countries in order to be awarded contracts. Unfortunately, former and present government officials such as Mr.Kwame Peprah, Dr. George Sipa Yankey, Amadu Seidu, Edward Lord Attivor, Dr. Ato Quarshie, Alhaji Baba Kamara and Boniface Siddique were mentioned. We must not be pre-judgmental in convicting the above mentioned names just because their names have come up.

Already, some personalities, media houses and journalists have started pronouncing judgment on them, a situation which is not the best since they must also be given a fair and equal hearing to state their side of the case as known in Latin ‘‘audi alteram partem’’ and after that is done then we can all be able to know the truth of this matter.

Although in far away United States of America where the President and some key Ministers including the Information Minister, are attending the all important 64th UN-General Assembly where been able broker deals to strengthen Ghana’s trade relations with other countries such as Argentina and Spain, as well as attract investments into the country, President J.E.A Mills, who some critics have tagged as slow and not been in full control of the affairs of the country, has already directed the Attorney-General to investigate the bribery allegation. The directive to the Attorney-General is to seek the court findings of the Mabey and Johnson case. This in itself has proven all doubting ‘’Thomases‘’ wrong once again and shown Ghanaians that President Mills is on top of issues and still committed to his Better Ghana agenda for good governance, transparency and rule of law in his administration.

With little retrospection, we were all in this country when top officials of the previous government were made to go scot-free without even conducting a single investigation let alone prosecutions into massive bribery and corruption under the guise of the slogan ‘’ Zero tolerance for corruption’’ with kick backs flying around which were brought against them at the time.

For instance, it is alleged that Alhaji Mutka Bamaba, who publicly admitted that he was at the Castle to help NPP MPs and members who were finding it difficult to secure visas to travel abroad easily by using the letterheads of the Office of the President. This same man also letterheads of the Office of the President to lure and entice prospective foreign investors, particularly from the Middle East, to come to Ghana to invest and he turns round to collect his due and some for government as well.

These are nefarious criminal activities that call for full investigations because it brought the name of the Office of the President into disrepute at the time but, nothing was done. President Kufuor at the time, instead of using all state investigative apparatus rather requested from the poor and vulnerable general public to bring evidence to enable him investigate this cases, gosh! How does he expect the public to do that?

Do you remember Mr. Agrrey Ntim, who carried sacks of money, opened a personal account and deposited government contract kick backs into it and many more scandals that I can not mention in here.

We must therefore exercise restraint as the President has given orders for a full scale investigation into the dealings of the company in Ghana from 1991-2005. And truly, this is another test case for the Mills led administration so far as his commitment to good governance, transparency, the rule of law. There is the need for Ghanaians to exercise patience and support President Mills as he seeks to investigate the case for all to know the outcome.

Adjoa Boahemaa