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Leave Woyome Alone!!!!!! – Tein-Ndc - Ashanti

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 Source: --

Ashanti Region - January 23rd 2012. Members of the Press, ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon to you all. I on behalf of the entire members of the Tertiary Education Institutions Network of the NDC in the Ashanti Region welcome you to this Press conference.

We invited you to this Press conference today to express our deepest regret and sadness about the recent irresponsible attacks against the personality of Mr. Alfred Abgesi Woyome and this NDC government by some elements of the public following the payment of about GH¢51 million by the state to Mr. Alfred Woyome as judgment debt.

Ladies and gentlemen, after carefully studying the facts of this issue and objectively scrutinizing the truthfulness of the allegations against Mr. Alfred Woyome and this NDC government, we are of the opinion that these allegations of fraudulent claims and complicity leveled against Mr. Woyome and the government respectively by the NPP and its cohorts are not only misplaced but flawed and ill informed.

Sadly this NPP led attack which is shamefully being championed by the Minority in parliament and AFAG have received the support of some individuals in the National Democratic Congress too.

It is against this backdrop that we wish to clear the air once and for all on this issue. But first, let us unearth the root of this issue thus Woyome’s claim for you to appreciate the truth for yourselves.

Woyome’s claims stems from a bid put up by a consortium (Vamed/Waterville) that he was part of in 2005 for the construction of Sports Stadia, six hospital and wellness center and a GAEC cobalt 60 plant for the CAN 2008 Africa cup of nations hosted in Ghana. Woyome’s consortium bid won the contract for the construction of the above- mentioned projects as per the concurrent approval of their bid by the Central Tender Review Board on 5th August 2005.

Mysteriously, this process was truncated by the erstwhile NPP Administration in a letter dated 22nd August 2005 signed by Honorable Yaw Osafo Marfo, then Minister of Education and sports in contravention with section (65) subsection (4) of the Procurement Act (Act 663) which stipulates that, once the Central Tender Review Board approves a winning tender proposal evaluated by a procurement entity, in this case the Ministry of Education is unconditionally obliged to issue a contract to the winning bidder. Both the procurement entity and the winning bidder are precluded from acting in a manner as to prevent the performance or coming into force of a contract.

Hence, Honorable Osafo Marfo’s illegal letter of 22nd August, 2005 failed to appreciate the crucial fact that the tendering process it purported to abrogate had actually been completed and therefore had no locus under the law to make the attempt he made.

Also the grounds of the abrogation of the tendering process due to the “inconclusive and non-assuring nature of the financial submissions” in Woyome’s led consortium bid as stated in Osafo Marfo’s 22nd August 2005 letter was and is non-meritorious.

It is therefore very prudent to note that Mr. Alfred Abgesi Woyome who available evidence reveals as the arranger or engineer of the financing for the bid at very huge cost to himself and his group deserved compensation of 2% of the arranged money (€1.1 billion) from Bank Austria being the cost of his financial engineering work. Hence the rights to this claim rightfully, legally and legitimately given him by the consortium (Waterville) as per their letter to the Attorney General dated 20th April, 2010.

Therefore, whether or not there is a contract between Government of Ghana and Mr. Alfred Woyome is completely and totally irrelevant. This is an NPP smokescreen!

Ladies and gentlemen, the current propaganda of the NPP and its surrogates like AFAG highlights nothing but the embedded culture of lawlessness and recklessness that the party continues to advocate ever since the Mills/Mahama administration came into power. It also reveals the whimsical and diabolical nature with which the Kuffour administration ruled this country for eight years.

The more relevant questions that we as Ghanaians should be asking are as follows:

1. Why did former President Kuffour authorize the unilateral termination of the agreement in contravention with the Procurement Act and Osafo Marfo’s advice in his memo to cabinet dated 27th July 2005?

2. Why has the expert advice from the Project consultant, Building Industry Consultants (BIC) and the Ministry of Finance on the validity of Woyome’s claim been totally ignored by the NPP and their Minority in Parliament in their analysis of this issue.

It is our fervent hope that EOCO will be extremely professional, courageous and independent in carrying out their investigations to unravel the cause of this liability to the state so the transgressors of the law would be punished.

EOCO must not renege on its legal obligations for some political or fanciful reasons. Honorable Yaw Osafo Marfo, Honorable O.B. Amoah and all other individuals who are running away from EOCO as a result of their complicity in this matter must as a matter of urgency be arrested and made to account for the roles they played in this issue. They must not be allowed to take Ghanaians for granted.

We also wish to send a stern warning to those individuals in the NDC and NPP, who are desperately trying to impede the revelation of the truth and the dispensing of justice in this issue to abstain from their nation-wrecking acts or face the furry of all truth-loving Ghanaians.

Finally, we appeal to all well-meaning Ghanaians to treat these baseless attacks against Mr. Alfred Abgesi Woyome and the NDC with the contempt it deserves.

THE TRUTH SHALL SURELY STAND!

Thank you very much for coming.

Signed: All TEIN presidents, Ashanti Region

Call Tel No: 0547681777-Gyamfi Samuel-President, TEIN-KNUST.

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