ASEPA BOSS Attacked Ahead of Bumpty Akufo Addo’s GHC 10 mill. Suit

Mensah Thompson, Executive Director of Alliance for Social and Public Accountability (ASEPA) has reportedly been attacked by armed men who bolted with his mobile telephone, laptops and other electronic gadgets.

The suspicious robbery came barely a day after Edward Akufo-Addo (Bumpty) the brother of President Akufo Addo slapped him and others with a GHC 10 million lawsuit for claiming that he had hijacked the presidential jet, Falcon 900 with registration number 9G-EXE.

“Yes it is true, I was attacked by robbers at home last night.

They entered my bedroom sprayed chloroform on me and ransacked the whole room. They bolted with a 65-inch flat-screen TV, 2 laptops, iPhone 12, Apple watch series 6, Wifi modems, a cash amount of GHC8,000 and other gadgets,” Mr. Thompson said on a social media post.

“In all this, I am grateful to God for my life, I was at the mercy of these robbers, they could have done anything to me but thank God the story is different and I am alive to type this. Thank you for the well wishes, I am safe!!”

The attack has been pointed out as suspicious, given the fact that he made a bold claim on live radio that he has evidence to the effect that Bumpty is the one using the presidential jet, while President Akufo Addo charters one of the most luxurious private jets in the world for official trips abroad.

Bumpty, the Managing Director of Amaadi Cold Stores Limited, had sued Thompson, Class Media Group and three others for defamation.

In a writ of summons dated June 1, 2021, the plaintiff, who is the younger brother of President Akufo-Addo, stated that during discussions on a political talk show on Accra FM called, ‘The Citizen Show,’ the defendants defamed him with their categorical claim that he had commandeered the public-financed Private Jet.

In his statement of claim, the plaintiff said, “on 29/05/2021 Kwabena Bobie Ansah hosted and aired on the 1st defendant’s Accra FM, a programme dubbed ‘The Citizen Show’ with Mensah Thompson and Listowell as panelists. The programme was also aired on Accra FM’s Facebook page, and two other stations”.

In the said show, Thompson stated: “…While he [President Akufo Addo] was travelling with the rented one, his sibling Bumpty is the one who now uses the presidential jet…I am telling you, that’s a fact. Bumpty uses the presidential jet, he uses it. The presidential jet is at the disposal of Bumpty. It is the one he travels in wherever he goes,” Mensah Thompson stated on the radio show.

He insisted: “It is a fact, I am telling you. I am saying on authority that the presidential jet, Falcon, is at the disposal of Bumpty…It is the Embassies who give us this information because they track the flight radar of the Falcon”

The plaintiff has however dismissed the claims, insisting that they are false and only intended to drag his name into disrepute and is therefore demanding damages in excess of GHC 10 million.

Meanwhile, tracking of the presidential jet by Whatsup News shows that it has virtually been turned into a shuttle across the sub-region for an unknown passenger because none of the trips had the president aboard it. 

For instance, www.flightware.com shows that every day from May 25, 2021, to Sunday, June 6, 2021, the presidential aircraft had hopped from the Senou International Airport in Mali, Abuja International Airport-Nigeria, Senegal’s Leopold Sedar International Airport and domestic airports in Takoradi and Kumasi.

The mysterious passenger of the presidential jet is unknown, but Whatsup News can say for certain that neither President Akufo Addo nor Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia had made trips to Nigeria, Mali and Senegal in the past two weeks.

The mysterious flights with the presidential jet between May and June 2021 is similar to trips made on Monday, January 4, 2021, when the jet was spotted at the Tunisian Carthage Airport taxing on runway 19 around 3 pm as it sets off for Cairo Egypt without President Akufo Addo or Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia aboard.

Both the President and the Vice President were around as they dust up plans for President Akufo Addo’s State of the Nation’s Address at the time.