Speaker Alban Bagbin
Richard Jakpa, the embattled businessman at the centre of the ‘defective’ ambulances, has issued subpoenas for 10 persons, including the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin, to testify for him in the ongoing trial.
Mr. Bagbin was the Minister for Health between January 26, 2012 and January 6, 2013, under the Prof. Atta Mills NDC administration when contracts had been signed for the procurement of the 200 ambulances.
The subpoena list, which has been granted by the court presided over by Justice Afia Serwah Asare-Botwe, also includes the current Chief of Defence Staff of the Ghana Armed Forces, Lieutenant General Thomas Oppong-Peprah.
Lt. Oppong-Peprah’s subpoena comes as a result of what Jakpa’s lawyers argue is the attack on his credibility as a consistently fraudulent person in a letter recommending that he should be sacked from the Ghana Armed Forces in 2007.
Minority Leader, Dr. Cassiel Ato Forson and Richard Jakpa, are standing trial for willfully causing financial loss of €2.37 million to the state, through a contract to purchase 200 ambulances for the Ministry of Health, among other charges.
The ambulances, according to court documents, are ordinary buses which are not fit for purpose as they do not have the needed equipment that an ambulance requires.
Subpoenas
Jakpa opened his defence and denied his involvement in causing financial loss to the state and has since been ordered to call the witnesses he indicated to the court he will be calling in his defence.
His lawyers have filed for a subpoena of some officials privy to the contract and issues surrounding the procurement of the ambulances for the state.
The list of people on the subpoena includes the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin, who was a Minister for Health under the Prof. Mills administration.
Also on the list is Alex Segbefia, who was the Minister for Health between May 2015 and January 2017.
Mr. Jakpa has also issued subpoena on the Secretary of the Ghana Armed Forces, Air Commodore Adu Gyamfi to also appear and testify for him in the case.
Others include Prof. Nuhu Zakaria, the Director of National Ambulance Service; Joycelyn Naa Korkoi Azeez, Director of Pharmacy at the Ministry of Health, Andrew Kufe, an officer at the Controller and Accountant General’s Department.
The rest are Dr. Sylvester Anemana, Samuel Sellas Mensah, a staff at the Public Procurement Authority and Juliana Asante, a staff of Stanbic Bank.
No Substance
Meanwhile, Justice Asare-Botwe has described the subpoenas as being of no moment because they do not contain the right information.
According to her, it was wrong for counsel for the accused to have filed the subpoena without indicating which particular documents they want each of the witnesses to produce.
“You know that this subpoena you have filed is of no moment. These subpoenas they are nothing. If you think that you will compel the witnesses to come and then you will now be asking them ‘if we give to the opportunity to provide these documents can you…’ that will not happen. I will not seal their mouth. I will discharge them,” the judge said.
The judge also warned that if the accused remises on calling his witnesses, she will consider his case closed.
Ato Forson Absent
Minority Leader Ato Forson was absent from yesterday’s proceedings, and it turned that he was granted permission by the court to travel and return on Wednesday, July 10, 2024.
But his lawyers have written to the court indicating that the MP, after seeing a medical professional, was given another referral date which was why he could not come to court.
The court adjourned the case to July 18 for Jakpa to call the Chief of Defence Staff as his first witness.
BY Gibril Abdul Razak