By William
Yaw Owusu
Thursday
May 17, 2018
The debate over the
opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) ‘dodgy’ GH¢4.6 billion contract
that was to establish a national switch to make mobile money payments and other
transfers interoperable (i.e. link to each other) in the banking and the
financial system does not appear to be dying anytime soon.
This is because the
New Patriotic Party (NPP) government, through the Ministry of Information, has
rubbished the spirited defence put up by a former deputy Governor of the Bank
of Ghana (BoG), Dr Johnson P. Asiama, on behalf of the NDC over the cost of the
contract, which has set tongues wagging following Vice President Dr. Mahamudu
Bawumia’s revelation that the contract sum was bloated.
Dr. Asiama, who
defended what many see as an attempt by the then Mahama-led NDC government to
‘create, loot and share the proceeds of the GH¢4.6 billion contract, said on
Monday that he was involved in the whole deal but the amount mentioned was not
true.
However, he was
unable to tell the public the exact contract sum.
Accuses Politicians
He started playing
victim and said some politicians were misrepresenting the facts in order to
tarnish his reputation.
Interestingly,
nowhere had Dr Asiama - who resigned from the Bank of Ghana in bizarre
circumstances - been mentioned in connection with the dodgy deal, which is said
to have been cooked for the eventual winner - Sibton Switch Systems Limited -
allegedly fronted by Roland Agambire of rlg fame.
Gov’t Saves $1.2bn
A Deputy Minister of
Information, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, at a news conference in Accra on Tuesday,
insisted that the Akufo-Addo-led government saved the country from “unjustified
extortion” by the erstwhile Mahama administration by re-awarding the contract
to the Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems (GhIPSS).
He said had the
Mahama government won the election on December 7, 2016, it was going to use
GH¢4.6 billion for the project but the Akufo-Addo administration has been able
to complete the same project with only GH¢18.4 million, adding, “This
government saved the country over $1.2 billion.”
According to Mr
Oppong Nkrumah, who doubles as MP for Ofoase Ayirebi, “The Akufo-Addo
administration at this stage is pleased to have had the opportunity to engage
all the stakeholders to correct what would have been an unjustified extortion
from the good people of Ghana if the old deal had not been abrogated.”
Poor Users
According to him,
per the earlier agreement, the Bank of Ghana agreed that Sibton charges “the
users of the platform, and who are the users of this platform predominantly?
These are market women, farmers and drivers. People in the lower class are
those who massively use these platforms that have been rolled out. Their
arrangement was that the company, Sibton, should charge these people $1.2bn;
that is essentially what they did.
“Government, through
the Bank of Ghana and GhIPPS, is paying $4.5m and the Ghanaian at the end, who
normally uses this platform, does not need to pay a private company $1.2bn for
their profit. This is a big saving to the people of Ghana.” Mr. Oppong Nkrumah
said, “The arrangement begs the question why GhIPPS was not even invited in the
first place to do the job.
Remember GhIPPS was set up to develop an interbank
payment platform here in Ghana, so, if you are moving a step further to add
interoperability platform, it only makes sense that GhIPPS be requested or
charged to do the job and that is what we have done currently. It will make
some people ask if somebody was creating a convenient scheme for persons to
benefit.”
He dispelled
suggestions that the initial deal was the best, adding, “There is no EOCO
report that claims that the Sibton deal is the best deal.”
NDC’s Claim Rubbished
The NDC alibi that
the project was in phases has been rubbished by GhIPPS’ Chief Executive
Officer, Archie Hesse, who confirmed that the entire project cost is $4.5
million.
“I know there has
been a lot of a talk about the cost of the mobile money interoperability
project, but the Central Bank owns it 100%, and we have a range of deliverables
to meet, which includes mobile money. As a result, we spoke to our parent
company - the Central Bank - and they gave a loan of $4.5 million to solve up
the capability of our system to meet this particular demand,” he told Citi FM in Accra.
Sibton Reacts
In spite of the
explanation, Denzel Lawson, CEO of Sibton, has said that the GH¢4.6 billion
cost being bandied about by the NPP government is ‘rubbish.’
He told Starr FM via telephone from his base in
Australia that “Now I understand that to put in place the Bank of Ghana
infrastructure in GhIPPS, they actually have to spend four or five million
dollars to do that, so, actually the country is four or five million dollars
worse off than it was before, by scrapping the deal it had with Sibton Switch,
so, you know, it’s rubbish.
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