STX WOES DEEPEN

B.K. Asamoah is the plaintiff in the case.

Posted on: www.dailyguideghana.com

By William Yaw Owusu

Thursday December 15, 2011.
The much talk about STX out-of-court settlement between the company’s partners is still in quandary.

The Commercial Court C in Accra presided over by Justice Gertrude Torkornoo, had granted permission to the partners to settle the matter out-of-court and report to her yesterday but it was still stalemate according to sources at the court.

A week before the court gave the order for an out-of-court settlement, the beleaguered Chief Executive Officer of STX Engineering and Construction Ghana Limited, Bernard Kwabena Asamoah who is seeking to remove the Korean partners from the project had given indications he was going to pay off the Koreans so the project could finally take off.

GKA Airports Company Limited owned by B.K. Asamoah went to court in effect seeking a declaration that the Korean partners are no longer owners of the project, a move the Koreans have vowed to resist.

The Koreans were the first to go to court over who owns the company when they sued B.K. Asamoah, Registrar-General and others for allegedly diluting the company’s shares to GKA Airport’s advantage but the Fast Track High Court presided over by Justice NMC Abodakpi adjourned proceedings sine die because the processes to get the case heard were not completed.

The GKA Airports suit is citing STX Engineering and Construction Ghana Limited and STX Construction Company Limited in Seoul as the 1st and 2nd defendants with Kook Hyun Kim, Su Jou Kim, Daniel Jung, Seong Hoon Kang, Yong Chan Kim, Im-Dong Park, Ji Hoon Hwang and Man Kang as 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th respondents respectively.

The plaintiff is seeking reliefs including a “declaration that by terminating the Joint Venture Agreement and Heads of Agreement, 2nd respondent renounced its membership of 1st respondent.”

However, the defendants (Koreans) fired back disputing the claims of the plaintiff and made counter-claims against the plaintiffs.

In their affidavit in opposition filed October 17 and deposed to by Daniel Jung, the defendants say they have not executed any transfer of its shares neither has the shares been affected by any law or statute.

He said STX Engineering and Construction Ghana Limited was incorporated on November 17, 2009 and the subscribers to its regulation were both STX Construction Company Ltd and GKA Airports Company Ltd adding “the 2nd respondent subscribed to 15,000 shares whilst the applicant subscribed to 7,400 shares.”

“The right of the 2nd respondent as a subscriber to the regulations of the 1st respondent are guaranteed and or prescribed by statute”, the defendants averred.

When the case was called yesterday, Osafo Buaben, counsel for 1st, 2nd, 5th, and 8th defendants - including STX Engineering and Construction Ghana Limited and STX Construction Company Limited in Seoul – told the court that Carl Adongo who is representing B.K. Asamoah was in the Court of Appeal for another case and wanted a short adjournment.

The judge then enquired from Mr. Osafo Buaben what had happened to the out-of-court settlement before considering counsel’s request but Mr. Buaben impressed on the judge to hear the ‘latest development’ in chambers.

“We will prefer meeting you in chambers for that aspect”, Mr. Buaben told the judge.

“I will only grant you the adjournment when you update me on the progress of the out-of-court settlement,” the judge replied.

Kizito Beyou another counsel then announced himself as an ‘intervener’ in the case and added his voice to the call on the judge hear that piece of information in chambers.

Messrs Buaben, Beyou, the judge, B.K. Asamoah and Daniel Jung representing the Korean partners all went into the judge’s chamber and after about five minutes they came out but nobody told the media anything.

As a result, the media was left in limbo as to the next adjourned date.

Even though President John Evans Atta Mills cut the sod in January 2011 for the commencement of the project, boardroom wrangling between the Koreans and their Ghanaian partners has stalled the construction of 200,000 housing units in the country, starting with 30,000 houses for the security services at the cost of $10 billion.