Kufuor, Oware to answer Bui charges?

The General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Johnson Aseidu Nketiah, has hinted that former President J.A. Kufuor, who was a board Chairman of the Bui Power Authority (BPA), and Mr Fred Oware, the former BPA CEO, will be made to appear before the board to answer some questions about the project.
Mr Asiedu Nketiah who is also a board member of the BPA, explained that the invitation had become necessary because “no board minutes covering the period the BPA operated with former President Kufuor as chairman of the board and Mr Oware as CEO were handed over to the current board”.
Addressing a press conference in Accra yesterday the NDC General Secretary noted that one such issue the new board wanted to find out was the rationale behind the acquisition of land to include major settlements like Bamboi, Tasilima and Carpenter which did not fall within the catchment area of the project.
He added that this was against the backdrop that the project did not make provision for compensation for land acquisition. “It must not be lost on us that when lands are compulsorily acquired by the state under Act 125, it is required that immediate and adequate compensation for all lands and properties must be paid to the affected owners”.
Mr Asiedu Nketiah wondered why at the inception of the project the NPP created the impression that it had three components; Bui Hydroelectric, Bui Irrigation and Bui City projects.
However, he noted that the new board had realised that whereas the hydroelectric and irrigation components were covered in the planning and funding arrangements, there was no feasibility studies, no architectural designs and no financial provisions for any preparatory work or implementation of the Bui City Project.
He added that whereas as per the project arrangement the BPA had no say in the mode of acquisition or sourcing of materials for the construction work, the BPA had no obligation to certify that the quality of materials agreed with the specification and standards contained in the project agreement.
Mr Asiedu Nketiah said it was a fact that granite aggregate whose quality had not been queried by the Kufuor board had been rejected by the current board because the quality did not meet the project’s specifications.
He produced a document from Coyne Et Bellier, consultants to the projects, to confirm the rejection which states that in part that “The aggregates from the zone of the quarry presently operated cannot, according to the contractor test result be used for structures in Conventional Vibrated concrete as they do not match the specification.”
He explained that when BPA exercised its right to reject sub standard materials, all the related cost was borne by the contractor, and asked what Mr Oware meant when he suggested that the current board insisted on a particular supplier of chippings which was going to increase the project cost by an additional $ 50 million.
Mr Asiedu Nketiah noted that these and other issues were the most important things that should engage the attention of the media and not Mr Oware’s tactics to divert attention from the issues by spewing half truths and lies calculated to tarnish his (Mr Asiedu Nketiah’s) hard won reputation.
Mr Asiedu Nketiah announced that his lawyers were on their way to the high court to file a suit against Mr Oware for libelling him, and unfounded allegations of conflict of interest and insider trading levelled against him.
He explained that on several occasions Mr Oware had engaged in several misrepresentations of issues, one of which was that under schedule number 17 of the contract, he fraudulently sought to misrepresent item 17.06 as Bui City and Irrigation project when in fact the document he presented mentioned irrigation structures with the sum of $ 12 million.
Mr Aseidu Nketiah took a swipe at journalists who attended Mr Oware’s press conference for not raising any question when minutes of a totally different body were distributed to them as evidence of meetings of the Bui board but this reporter during question time made it clear to Mr Asiedu Nketiah that Mr Oware never distributed anything like the board minutes. In fact, Mr Oware told the press that he could not distribute the minutes of the board to the media.