My Critics Are Jealous Of Me – Woyome

Controversial National Democratic Congress (NDC) financier, Alfred Agbesi Woyome, says those against his recent $8 million (GH¢35 million) engagement with the government are jealous of him.

Woyome is defending his recent transaction with the government, which was exposed by OccupyGhana last week.

He claims the deal, sanctioned by former Transport Minister, Dzifa Attivor, was to transform Ghana into a developed country like Malaysia.

If anything, it is my critics who are intoxicated with jealousy, Woyome suggested in an interview on Joy FM’s news analysis programme, 'Newsfile,' on Saturday.

“The kind of thing that we want to do is not from government. You people have said why is Malaysia like this and Ghana has not done that? And your own citizens are trying better to do the things so that you can get the Malaysia, and out of jealousy and envy you spew out this which are false,” he said.

The NDC financier is in a fresh GH¢35 million contract with government, with a promise to build a Deep Sea Port.

His new contract comes at a time when he is struggling to negotiate a repayment plan for an amount of GH¢51.2 million illegally paid to him by government in 2010 – an amount the Supreme Court has ordered him to refund to the state.

His company, Anator Holdings Limited, signed the new $8 million agreement with Dzifa Ativor on December 15, 2015, with Woyome tasked to raise funds for the project.

The business man initially claimed to have been employed by Anator Holdings, as a financial engineer, but was reminded by the host of the programme, Samson Lardy Anyenini, that the agreement he signed was in his capacity as the Executive Chairman of the company.

He later admitted to playing a dual role as the Executive Chairman of the company and the financial engineer at the same time for a company which started business in 2005.

Mr Alfred Woyome said his company only signed a non-committal Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority, which does not involve a pesewa from government.

“We did not force government to take any percentage out of anything….,” he explained.

But a member of OccupyGhana said the deal stinks and is likely to expose Ghana to some liabilities.

Ace Ankomah, a lawyer, said the shady Anator deal is in many ways similar to the Woyome, Waterville scandal in 2010 which led to the state losing a whopping GH¢51.2 million.

 SSNIT
According to him, the seeds of the second deal were sown in 2009 with the then Finance Minister, Dr Kwabena Duffuor, signing a letter for Woyome and his company (Anator Holdings) to develop a green township.

That letter, he added, was heavily conditional with a reminder that the agreement would have to be approved by cabinet and passed by parliament after which government will have a 24% stake in a joint venture agreement.

“It was non-committal in principle acceptance. This matter disappeared for a while. It started bouncing back again in 2014-2015, very similar to that of the financial engineering situation,” Mr Ankomah said.

There was now a lot of smokescreen. It was no longer just the development of Green Township. It had metamorphosed into Deep Sea Port project, a whole multi-billion dollar project, with Woyome using the non-committal acceptance letter in 2009 signed by Dr Duffuor as a binding contract and demanding that government must instruct SSNIT to take up the 24% initially suggested.

In November, this year, SSNIT was directed by government to take up a 24% stake in the project, but the Trust wrote back to government requesting further and better particulars of the project.

 Common Sense
An obviously incensed editor-in-chief of the New Crusading Guide newspaper, Kweku Baako Jnr, who was on the programme, said the new GH¢35 million deal is hard to digest and an assault on the sensibilities of the citizens.