Leading NPP official Gabby Asare Otchere-Darko has claimed that the contentious PDS and Agyapa deals were not done with bad intentions.
He asserted that the deals were not corrupt, in contrast to the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) and some civil society organizations (CSOs).
Gabby criticized CSOs in a tweet from August 15, 2023, who had taken the deal to a regional court in Abuja, which had rejected it, but who had since kept quiet about the decision.
He insisted that the deal would ultimately be in Ghana’s best interests, but it was abandoned for political reasons.
I wonder why Transparency International, Ghana Integrity Initiative and the CSOs who went to an international court over Agyapa have been quiet since July after their case was dismissed on all fronts.
“But, I thank them for that move. It is good for our democracy. And, I will urge you all to read the decision of the ECOWAS court. Agyapa, a very legitimate, even if controversial, move by govt to expand the use of its gold revenues, had no corruption about it. Zero!” he claimed.
The Ghanaian government proposed a deal in 2020 that called for shares of a business called Agyapa Royalties Limited to be floated on the London Stock Exchange in order to raise money.
Civil society organizations and the opposition criticized this agreement harshly, saying it was a covert and corrupt agreement that would let politicians enrich themselves at the expense of the nation.
Veteran journalist Kweku Baako later that year confirmed that Gabby’s company had acted as transaction advisors to the government in the botched deal.
He clarified that Africa Legal Associates worked for a UK-based law firm that served as the deal’s primary advisors.
In other news, the opposition NDC has given notice that it will protest the NPP administration’s ten percent tax on winning bets.
The party’s youth wing claims that it is an oppressive taxation measure that unfairly affects the nation’s youth and the larger gambling industry.
George Opare Addo, the NDC’s national youth organizer, expressed the party’s displeasure with the tax in a press release, saying, “The introduction of the 10% betting tax, part of the government’s efforts to raise revenue, has been met with criticism and concern.”
