“You’ve Never Managed A Hen Coop”-Says GNPC Boss In Blows With ACEP Boss

An explosive war of words between Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and the Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) has escalated uncontrollably into personal attacks.

The GNPC boss, Dr. KK Sarpong told Whatsup News in a telephone interview Thursday that the Executive Director of the Africa Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP), Benjamin Boakye is not qualified to critique his decision to use state authority to secure some US$ 1.3 billion to buy major stakes in the questionable crude oil bloc owned by Aker Energy.

He said Ben Boakye has “never managed a hen coop before” to gather the effrontery to criticise him.

This was in response to a revealing statement released by Ben Boakye exposing the dubious nature of the Aker deal.

In a rare flurry of media interviews, Dr. Sarpong had gone on the offensive disparaging the credibility and capacity of CSOs who have been raising red flags about the Aker deal that has the fingerprints of Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta written all over it.

Dr. Sarpong has told several media platforms that he was determined to push the deal through, regardless of criticisms, and that the CSOs opposing the deal had failed to understand the complexity of the deal and the value it will bring to Ghana. 

But in an open letter in response to Dr. Sarpong’s diatribes, Ben Boakye noted that the degeneration of the argument over the questionable nature of the Aker deal into personal attacks by the GNPC boss was a smoking gun that the deal is indeed shady and that Dr. Sarpong was trying to deflect the substantive arguments against the deal.

 Ben Boakye questioned the credibility of Dr, Sarpong to do a good job with the deal, given his track record of plunging into huge debts the major state institutions he had managed in past, including the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) and Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) 

“I have followed a series of interviews granted by Dr. KK Sarpong and sometimes froze, literally, in complete disbelief of what damage he is doing to the country in an attempt to litter the media space with hate for CSOs. By design or not, he injects extreme nervousness than I have seen. The strategy was evident; he pontificates his achievements in public life to sedate the minds of Ghanaians to think that he is doing the right thing with the Aker transaction,” the ACEP boss wrote.

“He tries hard to discredit CSOs in the crudest way possible, so the public will listen to him, not the CSOs. Additionally, he displays an unpardonable lack of control over the Aker transaction, which makes his amnesia of the history of Aker/AGM in Ghana almost forgivable”, Ben Boakye wrote.

In Dr. Sarpong’s opinion, CSOs like ACEP were simply attempting to bad-mouth the Aker deal because they did not understand the intricacies of the deal. 

But, in a sharp rebuttal, the ACEP boss said Dr. Sarpong is the one who is rather deliberately misconstruing the argument against the deal.

 “To avoid public scrutiny of the Aker transaction, the Kahuna of GNPC spends time bastardizing CSOs and craftily portraying that we lack knowledge of the entire transaction….As a civil society, we are happy to remain civil if Dr. Sarpong will choose that route. However, the fundamental questions we have asked remain unanswered. Rather than shadow-boxing, GNPC should come to the public arena to debate the issues,” Ben Boakye challenged the GNPC boss.