Cocoa stealing syndicate busted

The police have busted a cocoa stealing syndicate suspected to have involved some purchasing clerks at Juaso, in the Asante-Akim South District in Ashanti.

The Juaso police told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) that two people, whose names are being withheld, have been arrested and are helping in investigations to round up the others, allegedly involved in the stealing of 500 bags of cocoa worth about 270 million cedis.

The police said about two weeks ago, a Fiat articulator truck arrived at Juaso to cart cocoa from the sheds of Trans Royal Cocoa Company, a licensed private cocoa buyer.

It said contrary to the normal practice, the vehicle did not have any authorisation document from the regional depot to cart cocoa purchased.

Since the truck belonged to the company that had been contracted by the private cocoa buyer to cart cocoa from its stations to the Accra depot, the district purchasing officer whose name was give as Mr Oduro, innocently prepared a waybill and allowed the 500 bags to be sent away.

The police said two weeks after the cocoa truck had left, the District Officer enquired whether the consignment had reached the depot in Accra.

"The result was negative," police said.

A report was, therefore, made to the regional purchasing officer, which led to the arrest of the District Officer to help in the investigations.

However, when the police traced the vehicle number that was used in preparing the waybill at the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority (DVLA), it was discovered that the number was that of a Benz bus and not a Fiat articulator truck.

The source said the arrest of the first suspect led the police to Juansa near Konongo where the 500 bags of cocoa were allegedly sold to another cocoa purchasing company.

At the company's premises some cocoa sacks belonging to the Trans Royal Cocoa Company and which have been emptied, were recovered.