Special Prosecutor On tail Of Afenyo-Markins Over Ghc10M Contract Inflation At GWCL

The Special Prosecutor, Martin Amidu, has received a petition from a private citizen who is seeking to blow the lid off an alleged sweetheart contract that the Ghana Water Company Limited awarded to a private company.

According to buzz around the issue, the company in question received the GWCL’s contract at a rate about 120 times what the contract should have cost the tax payer.

Apparently, the heavy padding was set up so that up to ghc10million could be creamed off.

Alhassan Salifu Bawa, the petitioner has named the company as Intermet. Mr. Bawa has already served the SP a petition requesting that the Board Chairman, Alexander Afenyo Markins, be investigated over the deal.

According to him, he attached solid evidence showing that a contract that the GWCL had awarded Intermet at a sum of over ghc14million had been given out in spite of the fact that another company was offering to do the same contract for ghc2million.

Board Chairman for the GWCL, Alexander Afenyo Markins, is said to have nursed the arrangement with Intermet after Intermet sweetened him with a luxury 4X4 Land cruiser car upon his assumption of the Chairmanship of the GWCL in October 2017.

Mr. Afenyo Markins, who is also the MP for Effutu, has denied the allegation that he was bribed to give Intermet the contract, saying that the ghc14million contract to Intermet had been awarded in 2016, about a year before he became Board Chair of the GWCL.

However, Mr. Alhassan Salifu Bawa has pooh-poohed the claim stating that the contract had been awarded in January, 2018, three months after Afenyo Markins had become Board Chairman.

According to the petitioner, the contract had received the signature of the Managing Director of GWCL, Dr. Clifford Braimah MD and had been witnessed by one Gifty Jemima, who was then at the Legal Affairs department of the GWCL.

Salifu Bawa has laughed off what he calls Afenyo Markins’ attempt to use the media to explain away the alleged corruption saying it won’t wash because he has given cogent evidence to the SP to back his claims. In addition to that he also says that he has more evidence that he will release later on.

This same alleged corrupt involvement of Alexander Afenyo Markins with Intermet had led to a lambaste by former President Rawlings in Kumasi recently. Mr. Rawlings had cited Afenyo Markins as one corrupt public official that does not deserve to hold office.

The comment sent Afenyo Markins running to the former President’s house to explain himself, after which Mr. Rawlings withdrew the comment and asked that the GWCL comes out and clarify matters.