Okudzeto Ablakwa writes again…

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HON Okudzeto Ablakwa writes again… My attention has been drawn to malicious reports and dubious fact-check flyers by a pro-government and pro-Bawumia group known as The New TESCON Informants seeking to discredit my earlier oversight publication on the damning Auditor-General’s report on inflated single-sourced cocoa road contracts and how the Bawumia family are key beneficiaries.

In the circumstances, I am left with no other option than to publish more intercepted documents to vindicate the truth and eliminate any lingering doubt.

I am today publishing a copy of the single-source approval obtained from the PPA dated 14th May, 2020 and signed by Acting Chief Executive, Mr. Frank Mante.

Note from the PPA intercepted document that Resource Access Limited owned by the Veep’s brother, Abraham Bawumia was awarded two single-source cocoa road contracts with values GHS54,263,718.64 and GHS29,468,546.54. This is consistent with my earlier exposé.

It is instructive to observe that the company belonging to the Bawumias — Resource Access Limited, received the biggest single contract award, and they were also the only company on the PPA list to receive two single-sourced cocoa road contracts valued in excess of a colossal GHS83million.

The second intercepted document I publish is the GHS54,263,718.64 contract Award Notification Letter from Ghana Cocoa Board to Resource Access Limited dated July 02, 2020 and signed by Chief Executive, Hon. Joseph Boahen Aidoo.

The third intercepted document also duly attached is a contract amendment letter from the Ghana Cocoa Board signed by Hon. Joseph Boahene Aidoo which revised the contract title and also revised the contract sum upwards to GHS54,262,878.84 for the Effutu-Abremagona & Effutu – Sorodofo feeder road project.

For now, I shall reserve the other intercepted documents on the massive single-source procurement activities of the Bawumias across multiple government agencies as I observe the next malicious move from these pro-government and pro-Bawumia groups.

The incredible irony is that as we all recall, Vice President Bawumia was very loud in opposition against single-sourced inflated contracts, and he did not hesitate in launching vicious attacks on the former government.

We must consistently oppose wrongdoing in principle, and in the national interest — we must not criticize wrongdoing because it doesn’t benefit us or our families.

Fundamentally, all patriotic citizens must be outraged by the depressing findings from the Auditor-General that 87% of Cocoa Roads were single-sourced; that the non-competitive contracts were inflated by up to three times the actual value and that COCOBOD budgeted GHS1.3billion and ended up recklessly and opaquely awarding inflated contracts to the sum of GHS13billion.

Ghana’s current economic crisis, debt distress and bankruptcy are clearly self inflicted.

I shall be back with more.

For God and Country.