President and Chief Executive Officer of IMANI Centre for Policy and Education, Franklin Cudjoe has called on the Minister of Finance, Mohammed Amin Adam, to cancel the Kelni GVG contract, citing wasteful expenditure.
According to Cudjoe, the Minister of Communications, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful has been paying Kelni GVG $1.5 million every month since 2018 for no work done.
We’ve been paying $1.5 million every month for more than five years, and yet there’s no tangible report,” Cudjoe said, his voice laced with frustration. “Where’s the accountability? Where are the results? If they’re truly monitoring telecom companies, why aren’t we seeing reports on how much money has been saved? How many fraudsters have been caught? We’re told the contract is essential, but essential to whom?”
Speaking at an Elections and Anti-Corruption Summit Franklin Cudjoe, recalled an alarming example that had come to define his fight against corruption: the controversial Kelney GBG telecom contract.
It had been signed in 2018 with the promise of catching telecom fraudsters and recovering lost government revenue.
He explained that the contract, worth $176 million, was rushed through the system with little scrutiny, and government officials were kept in the dark about the full scope of the deal.
In May of this year (2018), IMANI began issuing a series of alerts and reports on the decision by the Ministry of Communications (MOC), acting in concert with its technical agency, the National Communications Authority (NCA), to award a 10-year contract worth nearly $180 million to an entity known as Kelni GVG.
In June of the same year, a Principal of IMANI, Kofi Bentil, acting as a public interest lawyer, commenced multiple lawsuits on behalf of Maximus Amertogoh and Sara Asafu-Adjaye against the Ministry of Communications on grounds of financial maladministration and threats to privacy.
A totally separate legal action was also underway by a company called, Subah, meant to injunct the take-off of the Kelni-GVG contract on the grounds that the contract infringed on Subah’s existing contract with the government which, to its mind, had been unlawfully abrogated.
Who’s that deputy minister? The dubious KelniGVG contract will be “ORALised” accordingly!
Adum| NPP MPs| Bernese| Mmoa pic.twitter.com/hjKIoFJ0jV
— General Marcus! (@marcusadampah) November 14, 2024
