Reader, do you know why most court going lawyers end up as politicians?
The reason is simple: you sit in the court room seeing Judges sentencing common ordinary folks to jail for stealing cassava, goats and small issues, then you pick your newspaper to hear of big names getting away with bank fraud, huge contract losses and in the words of Martin Amidu, gargantuan crimes against the state.
You know, it is so sad that human memory is very short. In 1979, right before our very eyes, Jerry Rawlings and his hot-headed revolutionaries lined up six Generals and shot them for “raping the state”.
One of them was Commander Joy Kobla Amedume, Navy Commander, always in white, accused of taking a bank loan of 50,000 cedis, secured with collateral!!!! Mind you, A BANK LOAN!!!
Since when in the history of the world did it become a crime to TAKE A BANK LOAN – more so secured with COLLATERAL??
And yes, Joy Kobla Amedume was butchered to death in the name of cleaning the state.
Looking at what is going on today in Ghana, I wonder how now septuagenarian Rawlings feels when he is lying down alone on his bed. “why did I kill Amedume?
I confess I have never met Dzifa Attivor, the resigned Transport Minister. This is not surprising because I am NPP and she is NDC so we have nothing in common.
But I honestly admired her because shortly after being sworn in as Minister of Transport in – 2013 she swung into action – moving up and down, talking tough. Quietly I told myself if all NDC Ministers would work like this woman, Ghana would be a better place.
Coolly I followed her news stories in the media until this metro buses branding fracass came up. What is this? It cost the nation 31.6 million Ghana cedis to BRAND 116 buses with pictures of a few Heads of State? How?
When the news became public, whether out of damage control or cosmetic window dressing, it was announced that the Chief of Staff had ordered an enquiry into the disturbing matter, led by the Attorney General.
Before one could say jack, we are told that Dzifa Attivor has resigned, peremptorily, in a statement signed on her behalf by her interesting named special assistant, EGYPT KUDOTO.
Reading all the media reports, in the process, and not saying anything new, the following points are of concern:
A pro forma invoice dated 1ih July 2015 signed by the Accounts officer of the Smarttrs Co sent to the Minister of Transport fixed the total cost of branding each bus at 31,000 Gh cedis. Payment for the contract sum, ballooned to 31.6m Gh cedis was made AT SOURCE in the Ministry of Finance. iii. The contract was performed by a lady, Selassi Ibrahim, wife of Ibrahim Adam whose company is Smarttys Productions Management Co.
What baffles my mind is that how can a Cabinet Minister ORDER the Minister of Finance to pay a sector ministry’s contract fee AT SOURCE from the Ministry of Finance? Usually the Minister’s vote will be sent into their accounts, and then the Minister will authorise disbursements. Iftherefore today Dzifa Attivor is resigning because of this grave act of
. causing bizarre financial loss to the state, is it that she is admitting responsibility or is it that she is being used as a scape goat or can it be that she has agreed to assume responsibility and then be pacified with some Ambassadorial appointment or what?
For me her letter of resignation side steps the central question. She should tell us in plain language – is it her WILFUL CRASS NEGLIGENCE that caused this reckless wanton dissipation of public funds? Or what?
Dzifa, what are the raw facts?
And don’t think – never deceive yourself that merely resigning will end the matter. It will not, because somebody has to explain how 31,000 ballooned to 31.6 million Ghana cedis, and somebody has to go to jail for that loss to the State.
If the NDC Administrator of President Mahama wants to come clean on this soil, they should arrest Dzifa Attivor and prosecute her, and they should ask Selassie to refund the money to the State.
If for 50,000 cedis (5 Ghana cedis) bank loan Amedume’s blood was spilled, then it does not make sense that we should paper over such gargantuan act of thievery – let us try Dzifa in open court and if found guilty send her to jail.
She deserves to live, not shot like Amedume, but her proper place is jail.
