ARREST AGGUDEY - Court Orders

By William Yaw Owusu

Tuesday, 23 January 2007
MR. George Aggudey, presidential candidate for the Convention People’s Party (CPP) in the 2004 Elections, is allegedly in trouble for failing to pay his employees’ social security contributions.

Yesterday, a bench warrant was reportedly issued by an Accra circuit court for his arrest.

Mr. Aggudey, owner and Chief Executive Officer of Gocrest Security Limited, a private security company in Accra, is said to have failed to pay to the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) about ¢8.1 billion as contributions of his employees between 1995 and 2005.

The court, presided over by Mr. Nathaniel Osam, issued the arrest warrant yesterday following the alleged failure of Mr. Aggudey to appear before the court for the second time, the first one being on December 11, last year.

He has been charged with two counts of failing to pay SSNIT contributions.

Prosecuting, Frank Asamoah, of the SSNIT Legal Department, told the court that Gocrest was registered with the SSNIT Scheme with registration 302J324.

On July 28, 2006, SSNIT conducted an inspection of the wages book of Gocrest and it was revealed that the employer has, between January 1995 and 2005, failed to pay into the SSNIT fund, ¢8,150,882,076.72 being contributions of his workers.

Mr. Asamoah said the arrears are made up of ¢3,378,855,762 as the actual amount and ¢4,772,026,314.48 as penalty for default in the payment.

A demand letter was issued to Gocrest by SSNIT on July 28, last year, but efforts to get the company to pay the amount have proved futile, the prosecutor said.