Prof. Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng
Lawyers for Captain (rtd) Edmund Kojo Koda, the security aide to President Nana Akufo-Addo, have threatened to sue former Minister of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, Prof. Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, if he fails to retract allegations of galamsey made against him.
A demand notice issued by Akufo-Addo, Prempeh and Co. gave the former minister who was the chairman of the erstwhile Inter-Ministerial Committee on Illegal Mining (IMCIM), one week to retract and apologise for what they describe as “baseless allegations” contained in a report on illegal mining against their client.
Prof. Frimpong-Boateng, who chaired the erstwhile IMCIM, has authored a report in which he accused some NPP officials of allegedly hindering the fight against illegal mining. One of the names mentioned in the report was Capt. (rtd) Koda.
The report accused Capt. (rtd) Koda of making frantic phone calls and asking for excavators that were seized by the committee to be released.
The report alleged that he “informed the taskforce that the owner of the concessions, Hon George Kwame Aboagye, the MP for Asene Akroso is his brother…”
But the demand notice denied the allegations and indicated that the former minister “knew at the time of writing to be false and malicious.”
“Our client instructs us that, the above statement contained in your report and attributed to him is false, written without any basis, malicious, and a figment of your own imagination calculated to impugn and/or discredit our client’s enviable reputation and integrity,” the notice said.
It further states that “Your callous and careless statements and comments, particularly where you stated that ‘…I was expecting people such as… Capt. Koda and others like them, who knew the President better and certainly had his interests and success at heart, to support the fight against illegal mining…’ have maligned the reputation of our client and subjected him to public mockery, opprobrium, and odium.”
The notice of demand said contrary to the claims, Capt. (rtd) Koda supported the former minister’s effort in combating illegal mining based on intelligence he gathered, “he sent a private message to notify and provide Dr. Frimpong-Boateng with all the details of the perpetrators of some illegal mining activity at Old Ayaase, Adansi, in the Fomena Constituency, of which he acknowledged receipt of the said information.”
“Apart from the above, our client has made other interventions to curb the illegal mining menace unbeknownst to you. Our client further instructs us that, at no point in time did he interfere in the work of the IMCIM, and he finds your accusations quite startling and unwarranted,” the notice added.
It, therefore, gave Dr. Frimpong-Boateng one week to retract and render and apology with the same prominence given to the offensive report, “failing which we have our client’s instructions to commence legal action against you to vindicate his name and also to recover punitive damages for those false and malicious statements in your report, and the cost of the action without further recourse to you.”
BY Gibril Abdul Razak