Barely a week after global business advisory firm FTI Consulting released an in-depth report following investigations on the concession agreement between power distributors ECG and PDS, opposition NDC has launched a scathing attack on government.
Addressing a room filled with pressmen, General Secretary Johnson Asiedu Nketia advised Ghanaians to brace themselves since the brouhaha surrounding the Power Distribution Service (PDS) deal it seems, is not going anywhere anytime soon.
“I will begin today’s press conference with the never-ending PDS scandal which you must be very familiar with. This subject has become so big and will not leave us anytime soon.”
Punching holes in statements made by President Akufo-Addo and subsequently his appointees involved in the fronting of the agreement, the NDC accused the former of deceiving Ghanaians thereby confirming the party’s long-held view that the citizenry had been let down by this administration.
Mr Asiedu Nketia further intimated that per the report it was revealed that criminal negligence on the part of government was what kickstarted the scandal surrounding the deal.
“The chilling revelations contained in the FTI report confirm the NDC’s long-held view that Ghanaians have been let down by the Akufo-Addo government. The reckless manner in which the rules were bent by government for PDS and the irresponsible manner in which the over GHS20 billion worth of assets of ECG were handed over to PDS, highlight the prevailing atmosphere of corruption and leadership paralysis that we are currently witnessing under President Nana Akufo-Addo.
The PDS Concession Agreement, approved by Parliament, contained 45 Conditions Precedent which had to be fulfilled by PDS before takeover for very good reasons.
Under Conditions precedent (CP) 24 and 31, PDS was required to provide ECG a payment security in the form of a Letter of Credit or Demand Guarantee with a value of US$350 million from a Bank. The purpose of this payment security was to safeguard the assets of ECG such that in case of default by PDS, Ghana through ECG could fall on same as a guarantee to recover our losses.
Paragraph one of the “Executive Summary of Observations” of the FTI Report shows clearly that, by an act of criminal negligence President Akufo-Addo reneged on his critical duty and refused to perform simple responsibilities that should have aided the process of securing the all-important Demand Guarantee or Letter of Credit from a Bank, as required by the Concession Agreement.
The extent to which key officials within the Akufo-Addo government shirked their fiduciary responsibilities to the Ghanaian people in complete disservice to the national interest is something we cannot fathom” he explained
Before the public forms any kind of perceptions about the report however, government has admonished Ghanaians to be patient and wait for the full report on the investigation into the deal.
Speaking on Accra based Citi FM, Information Minister Kojo Oppong described the leak of the report as unfortunate as well as misleading and prayed the public to “just tarry whilst it [the full report] is all put together in the various parties.”
“To create an impression that it is the full embodiment of the government position on the PDS enquiry and we find that very unfortunate because that is not the case.”
He further explained that the FTI report represented one part of the probe; the part which involved a trip to the United States of America for engagements with the Millennium Challenge Compact as part of a forensic.
