Explosive! US$ 170 million Judgment Debt Traced To Akufo Addo! Government should have paid US$ 18 million Instead

It is emerging that the biggest beneficiaries of the recent US$170 million Judgment debt against Ghana are family members of President Akufo Addo in a revealing web.

The comedy of errors, deliberate delays tactics characterising the activities of Attorney General Godfred Yeboah Dame and his greed of international lawyers have reinforced speculations that there are hidden faces that have may have directly fleeced the country in the gargantuan judgment debt to Ghana Power Generation Company (GPGC).

 Investigations by Whatsup News have revealed that GPCG is co-owned by President Akufo Addo’s direct nephew, Damian J. Duncan, who is the son of the President’s direct cousin-the 65-year-old Mrs. Adelaide Duncan Olagbaju. 

Mrs. Olagbaju was destooled as Queen-mother of the Bekai Stool in Akwamufie under curious circumstances. Her stool name was Nana Asaa Safoa II and was known to have been close to President Akufo Addo’s mother, Adeline Akufo Addo.

Whatsup News can confidently report that Damian Duncan is the Country Representative of the company that the convenient negligence of the Godfred Dame caused the US$ 170 million judgment debt against Ghana.

The entire process leading to Ghana’s loss of US$170 million is eerily indicative of orchestration by the kitchen cabinet of President Akufo Addo, Whatsup News has gathered from insiders and paper trails.

To be sure, court documents from the London-based United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) Tribunal which awarded the hefty judgment clearly show that Damian Duncan is a director of GCGP.

Also, snippets of evidence are increasingly pointing to the fact that the entire abrogation by the Akufo Addo administration of a power contract owned by Duncan’s GCGP was an elaborate charade to fleece the country of huge sums that may end up in the pockets of family and friends of the President.

According to former Energy Minister, John Jinapor, when the GCGP was awarded the power plant contract in 2015 following the power crisis that hit the John Dramani Mahama administration, the company did not meet the needed condition precedent, forcing the John Mahama administration to negotiate a cancellation of the contract with the company. 

A committee was reportedly set up to be chaired by then Energy Minister, Dr. Kwabena Donkoh. 

Eventually, both parties reportedly agreed that GCGP should be paid US$ 18 million as a settlement for the cancelled contract.

However, the Mahama administration was kicked out in 2016 and the Akufo Addo administration which took over power delegated Godfred Dame and the then-Attorney General Gloria Akufo to dig up the ghost of GCGP.

Consequently, the two, acting under the instruction of a cabinet chaired by President Akufo Addo unilaterally dismissed the settled case to pay GCGP US$ 18 million and “abrogated” the contract again without informing the Ghanaian parliament.

It was all done in a way that gave GCPC an impetus to announce that it will opt for arbitration.

The newly sworn-in Akufo Addo administration did not resist nor revert to the recommendations by the Dr. Donkoh committee to pay off GCPC with US$18 million. Rather, the government contracted London-based Omnia Strategy, a law firm owned by Cherie Blair CBE, the wife of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. 

Whatsup News gathered that Omnia that advised the Akufo Addo administration to stand its ground and challenge GCGP in the arbitration court. 

While these discussions were ongoing, Tony Blair had made frequent trips to Ghana on private missions and had had closed-door meetings with President Akufo Addo. The entire discussions between the two cannot be independently ascertained. 

While this tussle over the GCGP contract abrogation was happening in the background, Damian Duncans and the Akufo Addos have reportedly engaged in other deals together. Some turned sour while others resulted in mutual benefits, Whatsup News gathered.  

For instance, a deal between President Akufo Addo’s brother Edward “Bumpty” and Damian Duncan involving Litasco SA, Trafigura PTE to supply fuel (HFO) to power the Karpower power plant had gone sour, when an issue of double-crossing popped up, resulting in Damian Duncan reportedly causing the arrest of Bumpty’s wife.

Meanwhile, even though Omnia Strategy was the one that advised the Akufo Addo to head for international arbitration and was appointed as one of the government’s legal representatives, Omnia in collusion with Godfred Yeboah Dame practically abandoned the case at the UNCITRAL in what has reaffirmed suspicions that all along, they were not exactly committed to fighting for a better deal for Ghana at the arbitration court. 

Consequently, on June 8, 2021, UNCITRAL awarded US$170 million in damages to Duncan’s GPGC.

Details from the proceedings indicates that after a protracted foot-dragging, the court had granded the Ghanaian side a 28-day window to finalise their argument, however, Mrs. Blair’s law firm appeared at the UNCITRAL on Day 25 of the 28-day window and asked for an extension of 56 days. The court granted part of the days asked and set March 8, 2021, as the new deadline in what the court considered enough concession for the Ghanaian side.

However, on the deadline, the Attorney-General of Ghana and his expensive team of international lawyers refused to show up. They rather showed up on April Fool’s Day, citing COVID-19 as their excuse for failing to meet the deadline. 

The judge in the case did not find this amusing and shut the door on their faces, describing their delay tactics as “significant and substantial” and that their excuse for failing to meet the deadline was “unreasonable and intrinsically weak”.

In pronouncing its verdict, the UNCITRA Tribunal slammed the impressive team of lawyers of the government of Ghana saying it had no sympathies for them in losing the case, and that the excuses proffered by AG Dame and his team were unreasonable and “intrinsically weak.”

The presiding judge, Justice Butcher said the Akufo Addo government’s delay was “significant and substantial”.

A peeved Professor Kwaku Asare, a US-based Ghanaian law professor quizzed: “We have an Attorney-General Department. We have hired and paid two foreign firms, Omnia Strategy and Volterra Fietta. Yet, we fell asleep and did not take advantage of the 28-day window afforded us to challenge the arbitration panel’s decision that we should pay $170 million to GPGC for terminating a contract.” 

Critics are pointing out that the entire genesis of the Akufo Addo administration’s dubious abrogation of the GCPC contract was an orchestration to enrich a small circle of people associated with the President.