Posted on: www.dailyguideghana.com
By William Yaw Owusu
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
An Accountant
attached to the Ghana Youth Employment and Entrepreneurial Development
Agency (GYEEDA), Eric Sunu yesterday said a total of $2 million was raised as
invoice in the infamous GYEEDA scandal.
Eric Sunu who has been posted to GYEEDA from the
Controller and Accountant General’s Department since 2009, gave the breakdown
of amounts paid at an Accra Financial Court where Abuga Pele, a former National
Coordinator of National Youth Employment Programme (NYEP) now GYEEDA and Philip
Akpeena Assibit, CEO of Goodwill International Group (GIG) are on trial for
allegedly causing financial loss to the state.
Abuga
Pele and Philip Akpeena Assibit are standing trial for the various roles they
played in the GYEEDA rot which the Attorney General’s Department said caused
huge financial loss to the state.
The
Chiana- Paga NDC MP is accused of wilfully causing financial loss to the state
to the tune of GH¢3,330,568.53 while Assibit is being tried for defrauding the
state of an amount equivalent to $1,948,626.68.
The two have pleaded not guilty and are currently on
bail. They were present in court yesterday presided over by Justice Afia
Asare-Botwe.
Testimony
Led in evidence by Comfort Tasiameh, a Principal State
Attorney, Mr. Sunu told the packed court that the $2 million was paid in
instalment into the accounts of Management Development and Productivity
Institute (MDPI) and GIG between May 2011 and May 2012.
He said the invoice
was on MDPI letterhead with a memo attached which had the instruction to make
the payments into MDPI account.
The sixth Prosecution
Witness (PW6) told the court that in the course of processing the cheques,
Assibit came to him to say that he
wanted the cheques to be processed in the name of MDPI/GIG adding “when I
checked on the memo to the minister it was in the name of MDPI/GIG so I did
so.”
He then tendered in evidence the five different Bank
of Ghana cheques which he said he prepared for MDPI/GIG.
Mr. Sunu said “the first cheque for payment was made
on May 10, 2011 with an amount of GH¢826,153.64 paid to MDPI/GIG, the second on
December 12, 2011 with an amount of GH¢840,000 to GIG/MDPI, the third February
14, 2012 with GH¢760,500 to MDPI/GIG, the fourth May 14, 2012 with an amount of
GH¢451,957.44 to GIG/MDPI and the fifth on May 16, 2012 with an amount of GH¢451,957.45
to GIG/MDPI.”
He said there was another payment for Tracer Studies on
September 10, 2012 to Assibit at an amount of GH¢835,000.
He said he was called later on by the security agencies
to explain the reason why he made the payment to the personal account of
Assibit but said he expressed surprise because at all material times, the
cheques were issued in the name MDPI/GIG.
Cross examination
During cross examination by Raymond Bagnabu, counsel
for Assibit, the witness insisted that the internal audit office was attached
to the ministry and not GYEEDA and said he was not in a position to know
whether services were rendered before Assibit was paid.
He also said the memo categorically stated that work
had been done by MDPI/GIG and said payments were approved by the ministry.
Humado factor
He contradicted PW4’s (then Minister Clement Kofi
Humado) testimony that he (Humado) approved a payment plan and not actual
payment by saying that anything he prepared was approved by the ministry.
He said the minister had introduced checks (ceiling) to
ensure that payment beyond GH¢20,000 was to approved by him (Minister) and
therefore everything must be approved before cheques were prepared.
When Karl Adongo representing Abuga Pele took his
turn, the witness admitted that Abuga Pele did not prepare anything above the
limit (GH¢20,000) put in place by the minister saying he (Abuga Pele) won’t
sign anything above GH¢20,000 unless approved by the minister.
When counsel suggested to the witness that “A2 (Abuga
Pele) did not approve all the cheques you wrote. It was approved by the
minister,” the witness said “yes my lord!”
Previous witnesses
So
far, Nuru Hamidan former NYEP Deputy National Coordinator in charge of Operations and
now MCE for Asokore Mampong, Gladys Ghartey current Head of United Nations
Systems at the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, Mohammed Pelpuo, Head
of the Business Development Unit at NYEP, Dr. Shaibu Ahmed Gariba, former Director
General of MDPI as well as Clement Kofi Humado, former
Minister of Youth and Sports have since testified and cross-examined.
Sitting continues on
March 11.
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