Samuel Okudzeto-Ablakwa
A CERTAIN Fergusson Darko now on retirement after working with the Public Works Department (PWD) yesterday recalled how African Automobile Limited (AAL) was stopped from supplying vehicles to government institutions in the 80s because the company had cheated the state.
Speaking to Oman Fm in Accra he wondered why some of his compatriots especially Prof Kwamena Ahwoi who was part of the decision to suspend the company would today seek to defend it in the manner that he is doing today.
Going down memory lane he recalled that AAL who’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Hijaz was a friend of the then Chairman of the Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC) Flt Lt Jerry John Rawlings, short-supplied Mitsubishi vehicles for the state “but his friendship with the PNDC Chairman did not stop action from being taken against him.”
Narrating what happened at the time he said the company was contracted to supply 150 vehicles to the state but ended up supplying only 110.
The company he said went ahead to insist on supplying the vehicles to the various state departments “but we found that unusual and insisted that would not be done. We also raised the issue of the short-landing. The then Secretary of Works and Housing, Dr. Abukari Alhassan was not happy about our action and sought to punish those of us who stood up against AAL.”
The point of Dr. Abukari Alhassan he said was that “we were going to expose them.”
What preceded the foregone he said was that “I approached the PNDC Chairman and sought to tell him about the financial misdemeanor of AAL and some soldiers tried to stop me but Rawlings asked that I be allowed to talk. After listening to me he asked that I come together with some of my colleagues to his Ridge residence.”
He said when he arrived, the then head of the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) and Navy Captain Assasie-Gyimah and Kwamena Ahwoi were all at the place.
“After listening to me once more the PNDC Chairman ordered an investigation, a probe in which Kwamena Ahwoi played a part. It was recommended that AAL having been found guilty of cheating the state be banned from supplying vehicles to the state and their monopoly broken,” he said.
With the leading state newspaper given some of the vehicles he said “they did not show interest in publicizing the action taken against AAL and so little or nothing was heard about it by the Ghanaian public.”
According to Mr. Darko he was dismissed because of his role in exposing the company and the connivance of some officials.
“I told the PNDC Chairman about what had befallen me and he had me reinstated,” he said.
“I am ready to be sent to the stakes for execution for the sake of Ghana should my narrations about AAL be found untruthful,” he said.
AAL is not new to controversy. It was recently found guilty of illegal tapping of electricity and a peeved Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) demanded a custodial sentence of the company as punitive action.
The political plane today is awash with controversy over the importation of some Galloper vehicles allegedly for the state.
While some state players are fighting to the hilt to have the state pay for the cost of the vehicles including costs such as demurrage, questions are being raised by the opposition and other Ghanaians about the integrity of the demand for the payment especially the judgment debt which is being alluded to by Deputy Information Samuel Ablakwa Okudzeto and now Prof Kwamena Ahwoi.
The leading opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) maintains that there was no contract to warrant the payment and no court judgment regarding the judgment debt being alluded to.
It is set to be a long drawn out controversy with both sides maintaining entrenched positions although the legal arguments appear to favour the position of those opposed to the payment of the judgment debt being demanded. Prof Kwamena Ahwoi’s threat to testify against the state should push come to shove, has infuriated many Ghanaians who wonder why he would want to stand against his country.
By A.R. Gomda
