Daniel Duku
Venture Capital Trust Fund (VCTF) has revealed that six former officials and board members during the Mahama-led National Democratic Congress (NDC) administration, including former Keta NDC Member of Parliament (MP), “fraudulently awarded themselves loans” totalling GH¢14.7 million, using phony companies as the vehicle to siphon the funds.
The officials are Daniel Duku, former Chief Executive Officer (CEO); Richard Lassey Agbenyefia, former board member and former MP for Keta (from 2008 to 2012); Iren Anti-Mensah, personal assistant to the CEO who later became an investment officer; Frank Aboagye Mensah, the husband of Iren Anti-Mensah; Charity Opoku, former accountant; and Kofi Sarpong, an investment officer.
The CEO of VCTF, Yaw Owusu Brimpong, made the disclosure at the Day 2 of the Public Sitting of the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament yesterday.
Members of the Public Accounts Committee were examining the report of the Auditor General of Ghana on public boards, corporations and other statutory institutions for the year 2017 referred to the committee for consideration.
Mr. Brimpong said for the Auditor General to state in its report that the six institutions, which the VCTF granted loans to, could not even be located, was an understatement of the number of institutions involved.
“Between 2011 and 2015, 205 loans were granted to companies and about 90 per cent of those loans were fraudulently processed and disbursed. We have done quite a good job on that. I mean the current management and the board,” he indicated.
He stated that the current management and the board, on assumption of office, detected the “fraud” and referred those issues to EOCO and BNI for investigation, pointing out that “the total amount involved in terms of principal was GH¢14.7 million and interest had accrued on those loans to an amount of GH¢42 million.”
“For over two years, we worked with EOCO and BNI and the matter was eventually taken to court. Six people were charge, namely Daniel Duku, former CEO; Richard Lassie, former board member and former MP for Keta (from 2008 to 2012); Iren Anti-Mensah, personal assistant to the CEO and investment officer; Frank Aboagye, husband of Iren Anti-Mensah; Charity Opoku, accountant; and Kofi Sarpong, an investment officer.”
Mr. Brimpong said two months ago, three out of the six officials, Mr. Duku, Ms. Anti-Mensah and Mr. Aboagye, decided to go under the section 35 of the Court Act (Act 459) “which allows them to negotiate settlement and compensation with the AG and pleaded guilty at court.”
He added that the only thing which is avoidable under section 35 is custodial sentence, pointing out that Daniel Duku, who has been asked to pay GH¢15 million to Venture Capital, had refunded GH¢1.145 million.
He told the committee that Iren Anti-Mensah, a former Investment Officer, had already paid GH¢500,000 out of GH¢1.5 million she had been asked by the court to refund to the VCTF, while her husband, Frank Aboagye Mensah, had paid GH¢170,000 out of the GH¢1.1 million he is to refund.
“They have three months to refund those monies and failure to do that, they will have to go back to court and they will be sentenced because they have already pleaded guilty (sic),” he said.
According to the VCTF CEO, the other three, former MP, Mr. Agbenyefia, who was a board member; Ms. Opoku, former accountant; and Mr. Sarpong, an investment officer, will appear before court in October 2020.
“For the past two months, the total amount that we have received is GH¢1.85 million because those who took the loans could not be traced; that is why those who processed the loans were taken to court.”
“The officers were the beneficiaries of the loans. Most of the monies were traced back to these officials that included the former CEO, the former MP, former accountant, former investment officers, and that is why they have been asked to refund,” Mr. Brimpong said in an answer to a question on whether the current management of VCTF would consider taking up civil action.
By Ernest Kofi Adu, Parliament House