Hanan Abdul-Wahab Aludiba and Faiza Seidu Wuni
Former Chief Executive Officer of National Food and Buffer Stock Company Limited (NAFCO), Hanan Abdul-Wahab Aludiba and his wife, Faiza Seidu Wuni, were yesterday granted a total of GH¢63.5 million bail for allegedly stealing and causing about GH¢62.6 million financial loss to the state.
Hanan was granted a bail of GH¢60 million with two sureties who must be justified, while Faiza Seidu Wuni was granted a bail of GH¢3.5 million with two sureties who must be justified.
The two were ordered to deposit their passports at the registry of the court. They were placed on the Stop List at all exit points of the country.
The Attorney General (AG) filed new charges against the couple last Friday after they were initially discharged by the court following the AG’s decision to drop the charges against them.
Dropped Figures
Although they have been charged with 20 counts, the quantum of funds allegedly lost in the previous charge sheet has dropped, with the Attorney General introducing a new GH¢734,400 which Hanan allegedly took as rent allowance but did not use same for that purpose.
Godfred Yeboah Dame, counsel for the ex-NAFCO boss, had prayed the court to keep the accused persons on the old terms of the bail initially granted them, while drawing the attention of the court to the fact that the money involved in the allegations had significantly dropped.
Deputy Attorney General, Dr. Justice Srem-Sai, did not oppose the request, telling the court that both the prosecution and the defence had agreed that the old bail terms be maintained subject to the decision of the court.
Justice Francis Achibonga, after noticing that the amount involved in the charges had dropped from what was initially filed, reduced the bail from what was previously imposed on the accused persons.
Allegations
Hanan Abdul-Wahab Aludiba and his wife, Faiza Seidu Wuni are facing a total of 20 charges, including defrauding by false pretences, stealing, wilfully causing financial loss to the state, money laundering, using public office for profit, dishonestly receiving and intentionally causing financial loss to the state.
Court documents indicate that Mr. Abdul-Wahab operating under the name Sawtina Enterprise allegedly stole GH¢50,879,210 from NAFCO by transferring it to James Tieku-Apawu, a Regional Manager of NAFCO, between February 2017 and February 2025 under the guise of making payment from the NAFCO account.
He is further accused of defrauding by false pretences by receiving GH¢734,400 from NAFCO for rent covering the period of May 2017 and May 2019 at Chain Homes at Tseado in Accra.
The Attorney General alleges that at the time Hanan took the rent allowance, the apartments were not built and he was living somewhere else.
Faiza Seidu Wuni, on the other hand, is accused of defrauding by false pretences in her capacity as the proprietor of Alqarni Enterprise by making a false representation that she had supplied foodstuff to NAFCO, causing the state agency to pay her GH¢3,342,759.08 between September 2018 and August 2019.
She is also accused of laundering the said amount by taking possession of it, knowing at the time of taking possession that the money was acquired through stealing from NAFCO.
The prosecution’s brief facts indicate that in 2025, the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) and the Office of the Attorney General received information that Hanan has, over the eight years that he was the CEO of NAFCO, embezzled hundreds of millions of Ghana Cedis from NAFCO.
It says EOCO’s preliminary investigations revealed that about GH¢70 million had moved from NAFCO’s bank accounts to Sawtina.
The brief fact alleges that further investigations revealed that these funds were transferred in a series of 86 transactions between October 2019 and September 2023.
BY Gibril Abdul Razak