Kwesi
Pratt Jnr., the Managing Editor Insight Newspaper, believes the
evidence adduced by the former Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana
National Petroleum Cooperation (GNPC), Tsatsu Tsikata, before the
Judgment Debt Commission on Tuesday, has made the issues surrounding the
sale of the Discover 511 Drill ship in 2001 murkier.
The
Judgment Debt Commission is investigating how an amount of 24 million
dollars accrued from the sale of the ship to pay judgment debt owed
Societe General Bank was expended.
The ship was sold for $24
million out of which $19.5 million was used to defray a debt owed
Societe General. But the remaining $3.5 million cannot be traced.
When
he appeared before the commission, Mr. Tsikata vehemently denied
allegations that the drill ship was used as collateral to secure a
funding transaction with Societe Generale and further questioned the
valuation of the ship, which was subsequently sold for $24 million
dollars to defray the negotiated debt.
Testifying about GNPC’s
indebtedness to Societe Generale, which allegedly compelled the selling
of its drillship to defray the debt, he told the Commission that: “As of
December 2000 when I left GNPC, there was neither a judgment nor a
judgement debt against the GNPC or Government of Ghana”.
The
Former GNPC boss also accused former President John Kufuor of being
virtually a “debt collector” for Societe Generale as far as the
Corporation's indebtedness to the Bank was concerned. “…Certain
steps had been taken completely outside the framework of the GNPC law in
terms of how it was alleged that the Government had decided that
Societe Generale should be paid certain monies and the ways in which
those monies were paid and so on because it looked as if rather
unusually, the President of the Republic himself was becoming the debt
collector for Societe Generale”.
But Mr Pratt insists despite Mr
Tsikata’s evidence, there are still “fundamental questions” that needs
to be answered with respect to the sale of the drill ship. He, however,
wishes all Ghanaians wait till the Commission completes its
investigations before analyzing the issues.
“…the Judgment Debt
Commission is looking into these matters and we should allow the
commission to carry out its investigations and to come forward with its
findings. And when the Commission has come out with its findings, then
all of us would have an informed basis for running commentary on what
happened with the drill ship and other matters,” he argued.
Speaking on Metro TV’s ‘Good Morning Ghana’
program, the seasoned Journalist could not understand why political
parties and their spokespersons are trying to make political capital of
the proceedings so far, which in his opinion, is “unfair to the people
of Ghana”, “unfair to the persons who are appearing before the
Commission and to the Judgment Debt Commission, itself”.
“…I have
heard people who have also come to the conclusion that something
terribly untoward happened…I have heard people who have actually called
some of the Ministers who acted on this matter, thieves and so on. I
think it’s unfair, in the same way that the manner in which then New
Patriotic Party (NPP) treated Mr. Tsatsu Tsikata, I think it’s unfair.
“I
read the press statement which was issued by my good friend, Mr. Kan
Dapaah on the GNPC affair, which created the impression that all the
monies were paid into the pocket of Mr. Tsikata and so on. All those
things are unfair. Look, this country deserves better than what our
leaders are giving us. Let us give the commission a break,” Kwesi Pratt
posited. |
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