Posted on: www.dailyguideghana.com
By
William Yaw Owusu
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
Executive Secretary of Lands Commission Wilfred
Kwabena Anim Odame has said he never got involved in the payment of huge sums
as compensation to the Volta Basin claimants following the construction of the
Akosombo Hydro Electric Dam in the 1960s.
He said the only time he got close to the payment
was in 2012 when he supervised the processing of the payment of the fourth
tranche for the claimants as Acting Executive Secretary.
The Executive Secretary was testifying in Accra
yesterday at the Commission of Enquiry chaired by Sole Commissioner Justice Yaw
Apau which was set up by the President to investigate the payment of judgement
debts.
Cabinet approval
Cabinet,
in July 2008, approved a consolidated amount of compensation totaling GH¢138
million for various stools/families in Pai, Apaaso, Makango, Ahmandi and Kete
Krachi Traditional Areas and about 57 groups were said to have benefited from
the amount.
Records
at the commission revealed that GH¢71 million has been paid so far to the
various claimants and the disbursement of the remaining GH¢67million has been
put on hold to enable the government deal with discrepancies in the payments.
The records
indicate that most of the processes for compensation were done between 2004 and
2008 even though some claims dated back to the 1970s but the actual payments
started in 2009.
Some of
the witnesses who appeared before the commission have been tendering in
evidence site plans that did not have dates but had purportedly used the same
documents to claim the money from the Lands Commission.
Some of
the documents also bore the names of individual claimants but the witnesses
have claimed they were making the claims on behalf of families or clans.
Executive
Secretary
Mr. Odame told the Sole-Commissioner
that he did not have the chance to vet the documents submitted by Kojo Abban
& Co who were consultants and surveyors for the claimants because the
verification processes took place before he became head of the commission.
He complained to Justice Apau about a
report released by a professional group tasked to investigate the Volta Basin
claims and said “the content is damaging both local and international,” and
wanted the judge to ask them to apologize.
However, Justice Apau said the
commission was not in any witch hunting business saying “we will study the
report and give a fair assessment.”
AG
& Sabat Motors
The case involving the Addy Family and
the Attorney General together with Sabat Motors was also brought before the
commission.
Kweku Yamoah Paintsil, a private legal
practitioner who represented the Addy Family in the initial stages of the suit
told the commission that his clients leased the property to R.T. Brisco and
during the revolution the company’s assets were confiscated by the government.
He said the government proceeded to put
the company on divestiture which was subsequently acquired by Sabat Motors but
when his clients tried to claim accrued payment for rent Sabat Motors refused
them.
Counsel said at one point they got
judgement in default in 2004 against the AG but later the brief was taken from
their chamber and said he did not know what transpired eventually.
“RT Brisco itself was a tenant until the
government confiscated it and put it on divestiture for Sabat Motors to acquire
it. Once Sabat Motors was in possession they claimed everything belonged to
them including the land,” he said.
Dorothy Afriyie Ansah, a Chief State
Attorney representing the AG told the commission that the last time an action
was taken on the suit was in 2007 when the plaintiffs filed a motion on notice
for an order to set down the legal issues for the factual issues in the case to
be determined.
“There is no indication on the file that
the legal issues were argued. Plaintiff’s counsel set down the legal issues for
the factual issues and it is presumed that the entry of judgement has been
overtaken by events.”
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