Private legal practitioner, Martin Luther Kpebu, has disclosed some intriguing details of the docket on the Cecilia Dapaah case.
According to him, one of the persons who submitted a statement on the matter to the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) is a niece of Madam Cecilia Dapaah’s husband, Mr Daniel Osei-Kufuor.
He said the niece, who he did not name, became a person of interest because Mr Osei-Kufuor mentioned her as the one who gave him a sum of $200,000 for keeps. An amount which was also allegedly stolen by the house helps who are currently being prosecuted for stealing.
Mr Kpebu disclosed that in her statement that is included in the docket that was submitted by the OSP to the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO), Mr Osei-Kufuor’s niece wrote how she managed to bring the above-mentioned amount into the country.
“She wrote in her statement that when she was coming to Ghana, she distributed the $200,000 dollars in bits of $10,000 to some of the passengers on the plane she boarded. And upon arrival in Ghana, she retrieved the monies from them. Such cock and bull story. It is in the docket and Tiwaa says there is nothing to prosecute? Mr Kpebu asked.
Mr Kpebu mentioned this, among other staggering details as reason for which he and other Ghanaians have petitioned Parliament to look into the case of large sums of money found in the home the former Minister of Sanitation and Water Resources.
He said they want Parliament to set up a bi-partisan committee to investigate how the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) failed to do its work with “such glaring evidence that point to money laundering.”
To Kpebu, there is more to be investigated in relation to this matter involving Cecilia Dapaah.
“We want Parliament to set up a bipartisan committee to investigate how EOCO reneged on its duty to investigate Cecilia Dapaah.
“When we see money of this quantum in the home it points to money laundering, so go into the sources of the income,” he said on the Key Points on TV3 Saturday May 18.
Background
Some prominent Ghanaians, including former Auditor-General Daniel Yaw Domelevo have filed a petition to Parliament seeking a bipartisan probe into the conduct of EOCO in the investigation regarding the stash of money found in the residence of Madam Cecilia Dapaah, former Minister of Sanitation and Water Resources.
According to the group, which also has, Security analyst Dr Adam Bonaa, Professor Ransford Gyampo and over 100 other Ghanaians from different walks of life, argue in their petition that EOCO had more than enough basis to investigate the former Minister for money laundering as she has been inconsistent and unable to provide the source of the huge amount of money seized from her residence by the Special Prosecutor.
“The failure to explain the source of the money should have been the corner stone of the investigation,” the petition which was submitted to Parliament on Thursday May 16, 2024, noted among others.
It also raised concerns about what the group described as the deliberate refusal by EOCO to take steps to protect the money which had been seized from residence of the former minister by the OSP.
“Upon receipt of the docket, EOCO did not act timeously to seize the money that the OSP was returning to Madam Cecilia Dapaah as publicly stated by the OSP”.
The petition also said EOCO has been inconsistent with their public commentary and actions in the investigation.
The development comes in the wake of the standoff between state anti-corruption agencies investigating the former Minister over the stash of money.
The OSP is on record to have stated EOCO lacks the appetite to probe the matter despite the detailed information it shared with them.
