Gbevlo Storms Airport Over $10m Cocaine/Wee

Published in Daily Guide on October 2, 2012

 By Charles Takyi-Boadu & Stephen Zoure and Raphael Adeniran

 

Lt Col Larry Gbevlo-Lartey, National Security Coordinator

Checks at the Aviance Cargo village at the Kotoka International Airport, where drug traffickers have in recent times been using for their booming drug trade, have revealed that the cargo scanner at the facility has been tampered with.
According to reports available to DAILY GUIDE, the scanner broke down suspiciously soon after some containers had gone through it, a reason for which the drug lords were able to beat the security checks.
The latest arrests prompted the National Security Coordinator, Lt. Col. Larry Gbevlo-Lartey (rtd), to make an unannounced visit to the Aviance Cargo village at the airport where the 1.5 tonnes of cannabis and cocaine busted at the Heathrow Airport in the United Kingdom originated last week.
The cannabis, which was concealed in fresh fruits and vegetables, weighing around 1.5 tonnes with a street value of £4.3 million ($8.6million), was busted at the Heathrow Airport.
A day after the wee arrest, British officials announced the interception of another drug (cocaine) consignment smuggled from Ghana, weighing 7.5 kg with an approximated street value of £750,000 ($1.5million).
The National Security Coordinator stormed the place in the early hours of Saturday around 9am in a Rambo-style in the company of other security capos, in a bid to uncover the mystery surrounding the circumstances under which the seized cannabis and cocaine departed the airport without being detected with all the security scanners in place.
Gbevlo’s first port of call was the warehouse where goods earmarked for export are usually kept.
He, then in the company of one General Mankarta, an official of the Narcotics Control Board (NACOB) in-charge of security at the cargo village, moved straight to the said scanner which could not detect the busted drugs to inspect the facility and afterwards went to the various security check points to assess things.
The two looked quite disturbed about the security breach which led to the bust of the cocaine and cannabis haul and its implications for the country in view of government’s claims to have put adequate measures in place to curtail the drugs trade.
It is unclear what the National Security Coordinator told the security men manning the various checkpoints at the cargo village but sources said the move was to ostensibly put some fear in workers at the place in a bid to tighten security and to avert any future occurrences.
Booming Drug Trade
Ghana, in the past week, has been in the international news for drug trafficking to the United Kingdom and other countries.
The immediate past United States Ambassador, Donald G. Teitelbaum, had criticised the growing narcotic drugs trade in Ghana.
“Narcotic trafficking, narcotic uses are threats to all of us and Ghana is increasingly becoming a transit point for narcotics. It is also pretty clear that the use of narcotic drugs is on the increase in Ghana,” Ambassador Teitelbaum told a group of Ghanaian journalists at the US Embassy just before he left the country after the end of his duty tour in August.
Though some workers at the Aviance claimed the scanner in question developed a technical fault on the fateful day when the drugs left the country, others also believed it was deliberately rendered useless to enable the narcotics to go through without detection.
The Executive Secretary of the Narcotic Control Board (NACOB), Yaw Akrasi Sarpong, was fuming on radio when he alleged that security officers at the cargo village who were on duty on the day of the drug bust were strangely asked to go home.
The NACOB boss pointed accusing fingers at Airport Profiling and Security Services, the company responsible for assaying goods before loading onto outbound aircraft.
In the case of the busted cannabis at the London Heathrow Airport, it was loaded onto a Virgin Atlantic airline.
Broken Down Scanner
Credible information indicated that on that fateful day, only one cargo went through the scanner at the cargo village and cleared for export.
The rest, including those that contained the cannabis, according to sources, did not go through the scanner because of a supposed technical fault but were cleared for export.
It is believed that a drug syndicate, in league with some workers at the cargo village, was behind some of these narcotics trades.
The man behind the busted drugs is believed to have fled the country to an unknown destination.
Sources in the UK also hinted that the smugglers usually used one of the weakest security links at the Heathrow Airport, Terminal 3, where most flights from Ghana often offloaded their cargo.
Heathrow has tightened security at certain terminals upon realising that some flights from Ghana preferred to offload their goods through those places.
Border Force officials at the Heathrow afterwards indicated that the busted cannabis in tape-wrapped compressed packages within boxes was the biggest cannabis seizure in three years.
Investigations have been launched and five officials of the Narcotics Control Board (NACOB), Kamaldeen Awudu, Worlanyo Fiano, Ibrahim Badoo, Marvin Amon-Kotei and Ben Kusi Asante have been rounded up by the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) in connection with the seizure. They have however been released on bail.
A supervisor at Aviance was also picked up on Friday evening for interrogation.
Resignation
The embattled Executive Secretary of Narcotics Control Board, Yaw Akrasi Sarpong, has indicated that he might resign over the image-denting narcotic incident.
DAILY GUIDE gathered that preliminary conclusions from police investigations had cited official complicity and negligence of all the other security agencies at post.
Mr Sarpong said he was ready to take full responsibility for lapses in his outfit: “I am a strong believer in God, I take full responsibility.”

Confirmed! Konadu For NDP

Published in Daily Guide on September 27, 2012

By Charles Takyi-Boadu

 

IT’S FINAL! Mr and Mrs Rawlings

It is now confirmed that former First Lady Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings is behind the formation of the National Democratic Party (NDP), a breakaway party from the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC).
The core supporters of the NDP are disgruntled members of the NDC.
The NDP has also rubbished media reports that NDC founder, former President Jerry John Rawlings, would be campaigning for the ruling party, saying that he was in the boat of the breakaway party.
Even though Nana Konadu continues to remain tight-lipped over whether or not she was behind the new party, initial speculations had linked her as the brain behind the NDP without any concrete proof.
However, Mrs Rawlings has been captured on an audio recording conscientising NDP faithful, telling them why they needed to join the new party to chart a new course.
The former First Lady is believed to have made these and other comments during a meeting with NDP sympathisers at the SSNIT Hall in Kumasi when she visited the Ashanti Region somewhere last week.
The NDP presidential hopeful is expected to begin her Brong Ahafo regional tour soon as part of the party’s attempt at winning more souls.
Mrs. Rawlings, who spoke Twi, expressed disappointment in the current leadership of the NDC which she accused of destroying the party they all toiled so much to form.
“You all know that we used our strength and hard work to build the NDC but they have used their strength to collapse it; that is what hurts me sometimes,” she noted.
In that regard, she noted, “If we have come today; we want you to know that we are not following a negative course…that is why we have the dove as our symbol.”  She extolled the virtues of the bird—a sign of peace, unity, togetherness, honesty and closeness.
She asked supporters of the newly formed party to help wrest power from the NDC in the upcoming general elections.
Nana Konadu said, “They say they are a Congress and that everybody is welcome to join; so you can’t discriminate against any person and say that this woman can’t join…”
She therefore implored that “before you retire to bed everyday, I beg all of you to remember to go on your knees and pray for the NDP; so that we become victorious to enable us to come and change the country with good policies for things to be better for you, your children and grandchildren and every Ghanaian.”
She claimed a dove does not begin looking elsewhere upon the death of its male partner.
That, according to Mrs. Rawlings, “signifies something–that we are determined to be faithful to people and an aspect of faithfulness is the reason why I have brought my baby today”. She explained why the party came up with the red, green, white and black umbrella with the eagle on top as the symbol of the NDC, making nonsense the assertions of some individuals who claimed to have brought the idea.
The Rawlings Factor
Meanwhile, a statement issued by the Communications team of the NDP and jointly signed by Dr Hilarius Asiwome Abiwu, Dr David Sunu and Ursula Tagoe, has denied claims by leading members of the NDC that Mr Rawlings had endorsed President John Mahama and would therefore campaign for him in the upcoming elections.
“This is practically impossible, and is only a cheap propaganda by the ruling NDC to use the name of the founder whom they have literally ostracized from the party to energise their inactive campaign machinery,” the statement said.
They talked of loss of integrity and deep-seated corruption in the NDC, wondering whether those were the qualities the NDC wanted Mr Rawlings to be campaigning for.
“It is the candid view of the NDP that the question of which party former President Rawlings will campaign for in the December elections is a foregone conclusion as the core values of the NDP and those of President Rawlings are deeply interlinked,” the statement noted.
Elvis Afriyie Ankrah, deputy Minister of Local Government and Campaign Coordinator of John Mahama 2012, had told the media that Mr Rawlings would lead the NDC campaign, a move the NDP has described as a big joke.
The leadership of the NDP has entreated their numerous supporters and the Ghanaian public to ignore the propaganda schemes of the NDC and be rest assured that President Rawlings would campaign for the NDP for the December elections since “our formation is geared towards restoring those values he loved and remains steadfast to defend and protect”.

NPP Jabs Mahama Over Corruption

Published in Daily Guide on September 26, 2012

By Charles Takyi-Boadu

 

 

Jake Otanka Obetsebi-Lamptey

The New Patriotic Party (NPP) yesterday dissected President John Dramani Mahama, virtually declaring him unfit to hold the high office of president of the land.
The party mentioned a number of stinky deals it said President Mahama had superintended since 2009, saying he lacked the credibility to lead the country, and warning that “a vote for JDM is a vote for hopelessness for the youth and a vote for corruption.”
The brother of President Mahama was particularly singled out by the NPP who cited him in a transaction that smacked of fraud on the contributors of the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) pension fund.
A company owned by Ibrahim Mahama, junior brother of the president, Engineers and Planners, was said to have virtually collapsed the Merchant Bank, owned by SSNIT contributors, through over exposure to non-secured loans.
At a press conference in Accra yesterday, Deputy Communications Director of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Yaw Buaben Asamoa raised issues about the circumstances under which Engineers and Planners Limited, owned by Ibrahim Mahama, benefitted from the sale of Merchant Bank Ghana (MBG), a company in which SSNIT contributors owned 98 percent stake, to a South African Bank, FirstRand.
Under the terms of the sale, the FirstRand was required to pay an amount of 746.2 million South African Rand, the equivalent of $91million for a 75 percent stake in Merchant Bank Ghana to expand its presence on the continent in a deal that was approved by the Government of Ghana (GoG).
At the time, Merchant Bank, which was one of the few remaining Ghanaian banks in the country, was said to be reeling under a heavy burden of a GH¢330million debt which was choking the bank to an eventual collapse.
Among the list of companies and individuals that were indebted to the bank was Ibrahim’s Engineers and Planners, owing not less than GH¢57.2m, representing 19.1% of the total debt owed the bank before it was sold out.
Interestingly, much of these loans had been turned into bad debts while the Managing Director of Merchant Bank, who signed off the loans and was sacked for error of judgment, was said to be in the office of President Mahama now as an Advisor, raising eyebrows.
What seemed to baffle the leadership of the NPP was the fact that the transaction excluded some of the loans on the Bank’s balance sheet.
The Issue
Meanwhile, existing shareholders are expected to continue to collect outstanding balances.
For the NPP, what this meant was that “suffering workers of Ghana have been forced to swallow the bad debts incurred by some business people so that those business people can go on enjoying their lives of luxury, including flying around in their private jets.”
This, according to Mr Buaben Asamoa, was because “the pension of Ghanaian workers have been sacrificed to pay off debts that they knew nothing of so that some few people could continue having access to their privileged lives of comfort and opulence.”
Nevertheless, the NPP said they did not wish Ibrahim, the President’s brother, who they described as “the young, very enterprising man” ill, adding, “In fact we celebrate success.”
“When your company falls into bad debt and cannot service its loans and the pension funds of the workers of Ghana are forced by the President, who happens to be your brother, for that pension fund to ring fence and take on your debt, then we have to ask some serious questions.”
In view of this and a host of crucial issues involving the President including his role in the infamous STX Korean housing deal, which ended in a fiasco among others, the NPP as a party believed that President Mahama lacked the integrity to lead the country.
They equally believed a vote for him would be a vote for the sellout of Ghana’s future since “he has nothing to offer to the youth”.