Joseph Siaw Agyapong
The Appolonia Stool has stated that it has no hand in the alleged sale of 1,000 acres of land to the SINO Africa Company Limited, a subsidiary of Zoomlion/Jospong Group of Companies.
According to Joshua Nii Akpeng Tettey, Secretary to the Stool, the company did not acquire the land from legitimate grantors.
At a news conference on September 7, 2016, Gabriel Forceby, Operations Manager of the SINO Africa Company Limited, insisted that his outfit acquired the land from Nii Iddrisu Mansro, Seth Gblie Narteh and Seth Afum.
He is quoted to have stated that the trio consented to the lease of the said land to the company.
Mr Forceby further claimed that SINO conducted a number of searches at the relevant government agencies before negotiating with the three ‘legitimate owners.’
However, at a news conference on Tuesday, Mr Tettey dismissed the claims by Mr Forceby.
Quoting from a 2000 Supreme Court judgment, he stated emphatically that the said Nii Iddrisu has never been a chief of Appolonia.
The Appolonia Stool Secretary argued that the legitimate and gazetted chief of Appolonia is Nii Nuettey Anobi II who succeeded the late Nii Tei Adumuah II two years ago.
He said “the above explanation goes to confirm that Gabriel and his SINO Africa Company Limited acquired their lands from the wrong grantors because firstly it was not Nii Tei Adumua II of blessed memory who sold the land to the company in 2010; he never allocated 1,000 acres of land to the company and the substantive chief has no knowledge of the transaction.”
Mr Tettey alleged that “Nii Iddrisu and his cohorts connived with some bad officials at the Lands Commission to dubiously place their names on the land records of Appolonia to deceive the unsuspecting members of the general public.”
He said until the arrival of the company in the town, the people of Appolonia knew little about land guards, stressing that “we strongly believe that Forceby and his boss (Joseph Siaw Agyapong) knew they were dealing with the wrong people, but thought they could rely on the influence of some powerful politicians in the area.”
Mr Tettey claimed the activities of the land guards in the community formed part of the vengeance of Joseph Nii Laryea Afotey Agbo, the Greater Accra Minister because an indigene of Appolonia challenged him in the primary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC).
The statement further noted that the people of Appolonia would support the chiefs and his elders to reclaim all Appolonia lands acquired illegally.
By Jeffrey De-Graft Johnson