Manasseh Azure Awuni in a handshake with Siaw Agyepong
RENOWNED BROADCAST Journalist and Host of ‘Good Evening Ghana’ on Metro TV, Paul Adom-Otchere has hailed the Executive Chairman of the Jospong Group of Companies, Joseph Siaw Agyepong, as an “asset” to Ghana rather than a “liability” as a section of the Ghanaian populace have been made to believe.
Mr. Adom-Otchere, in an apparent defence of the Jospong Group boss, said “He [Siaw Agyepong] may have his wrongs but he is an asset to this country.”
His defence is coming at the time the police CID had also jumped into the case probing the alleged inflating of contracts. According to information monitored on Joy Fm, the Executive Chairman of the Jospong Group of Companies, Mr Agyapong has been invited by the police for questioning over the allegations.
The CID, according to sources, wrote to Mr Agyapong following Joy News report detailing questionable contracts involving subsidiaries of the Jospong Group. The letter was reportedly sent yesterday afternoon.
The CID also wrote to Joy News’ investigative journalist, Manasseh Azure Awuni, to assist in the investigations into a waste bin contract awarded to subsidiaries of the Group.
Mr Awuni after nine months of investigations alleged that the Local Government Ministry last year awarded a $74 million contract to five subsidiaries of the Jospong Group to supply one million waste bins and 90,000 bin liners
Manasseh had already put the spotlight on the Jospong Group in what he termed questionable contracts the Group had with the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development (MLGRD) under the NDC administration.
A recent report by Joy News claimed that the contract awarded by MLGRD for the procurement of one million waste bins and disposable bin liners has been inflated by at least GH¢130 million.
Heated Debate
In the wake of the allegations made by the Multimedia Group against the Jospong Group of Companies, the Ghana Journalists’ Association (GJA) issued a statement signed by its President Affail Monney, cautioning journalists to be mindful of pronouncing certain people guilty over corruption charges in the media “without trial by a court of competent jurisdiction.”
The Association said “we should also be mindful of using the media to wage a smear campaign against individuals, especially local businesses and personalities who have made substantial contribution to the growth of the economy especially at a time when government is calling on the private sector to support its rebuilding of the economy to create more jobs and prosperity for all.”
Support Jospong
But Mr. Adom Otchere is seemingly siding with the GJA on the need for the media not to wage a smear campaign against individuals, especially local businesses and personalities who have made substantial contributions to the growth of the Ghanaian economy.
On his Good Evening Ghana programme on Tuesday, 5 September, 2017, Mr Adom-Otchere declared his support openly for the Jospong boss, saying he (Adom Otchere) decided to associate himself with Mr Agyapong because in “my small reading of economics, it is not politicians who build a country, it is entrepreneurs who build a country and when you have entrepreneurs, the politicians are supposed to support them…”
He explained that “From the time of Rockefeller in the 19th century, the American establishment has supported Rockefeller as a businessman, as an entrepreneur.”
“ I’m not saying when they do wrong, don’t say it, you can say it, but the reason why I am close to him – and it took me about four years to find him,” Mr. Adom-Otchere said, adding that “sometimes you call him and he won’t pick, he is still like that, six weeks you won’t find him, but when you find him, he’s able to tell you so many things that shock you: his ideas and you’ll see that his entrepreneurship is a gift – so as far as I am concerned, this man, Joseph Siaw Agyapong, is not a liability to Ghana, he is an asset.”
Mr. Agyapong controls one of Ghana’s biggest business conglomerates, the Jospong Group of Companies which has over 40 subsidiaries including waste management giant, Zoomlion and a bank.
BY Melvin Tarlue