Former Managing Director of the Bulk Oil Storage and Transport (BOST) Kwame Awuah Darko has denied the allegations of thievery through some suspected illegal payments at the Bulk Oil Storage and Transportation Company Limited (BOST) to the previous Mahama administration.

The Centre for National Affairs (CNA), a pressure group, has petitioned the Office of the Special Prosecutor to initiate criminal investigations into some illegal transfers done by the former BOST MD, Awuah Darko to the Mahama government.

CNA, in a letter signed by its Executive Director, Samuel Odame Lartey, said it has ‘gathered’ evidence that a whopping GH¢40.5 million was transferred from BOST to the presidency under John Mahama.

They claimed the recipient’s account was Chief of Staff’s Sundries Account No. 1, with account number 1018631473188 at the Bank of Ghana (BoG), and the alleged illegal transfers were done from August 2015 until early January 2017 when then ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) handed over to the New Patriotic Party (NPP) after the December 7, 2016 general election.

But Mr. Awuah Darko in a telephone interview with Kasapa FM’s Akwasi Nsiah has contested the claims made by the group insisting he’d never been involved in  any collusion with government officials to rip off the state as being claimed.

According to him, approvals were granted at all levels to protect the legitimacy of the said transaction[ Transfers to Chief of Staff sundries account].

He adds: “So the story that EOCO is chasing me is palpably false….. and the issue of transfers to the CoS is not illegal as is being suggested…In fact if one wants to steal money, why would one transfer the money to a statutory account held by the Chief of Staff, which can be audited at any point in time.”

Read the full reaction of Awuah Darko below

On receipt of their letter I called the office and spoke to the DG’s assistant. I followed our conversation up with a letter which I copied my lawyers on. In my response to EOCO, I gave them my telephone number and my email on which I could be reached on. EOCO has not responded to my letter either by email or by phone to date.

EOCO is not and cannot be chasing me since they know of my whereabouts

Transfers to Chief of Staff sundries account…

They dropped a letter of in my house somewhere towards the end of March and early May, which was sent to me by my office in Accra

This account is not a fake account, neither is the Chief of Staff of the President of the Republic of Ghana a fake position.
BOST as you are aware in charge of fuel security in the country.

BOST by virtue of this mandate took up the task of supplying fuel to Armed Forces and the Presidency at the request of the CDS (Admiral Quarshie) and the CoS because the Goods & Services budget allocated to them by MoFEP was inadequate to keep them operational

Needless to say our hitherto smooth sailing situation with Goil ran into serious reconciliation issues as a result of the confusion around which fuel we supplied went to the security services, and which went to Goil.

After BOST made a number of regular monthly supplies, probably in the region of 6 or 7 months, our attention was drawn to the fact that we were not an OMC and as such we could not supply the military directly and so we commenced the supply via Go Energy and Goil whom we were also supplying through the Strategic Reserve Petroleum Program I had instituted at BOST.

It was at this point when a decision was made that in order to avoid the reconciliation issues and not put the entire fuel security program at risk we come up with a solution that keeps the Military and the Presidency’s fuel operations running…

As such at the end of every month we would look at the cash that had accrued into that fund (bearing in mind, the cash accruing into that fund, by virtue of its set up, did not belong to BOST and could not be used by the company) was duly paid into the designated account for the funds the Chief of Staff sundries account… This I can say on authority, was used to fuel the entire Presidency, including the Presidential Jet and other National Security operations….

In this respect I went to my Board and got approval that internally BOST funds this by putting 5 pesewas on top of ALL our sales out of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve Program to fund fueling the Presidency and selected Security Services…..

Presidential request and approval (via the Chief of Staff’s office, Ministerial approval, via the Ministry of Petroleum, captured in a Memo and sent to the BOST board which also duly approves the transaction….

Please note that approvals were granted at all levels to protect the legitimacy of the transaction

EOCO knows this because they have investigated the matter…In actual fact about 3 weeks ago my Board Chairman Kakra Essamuah was invited by EOCO on this same issue, he provided the C’ssion with all the relevant information in addition to confirming verbally to them all the above…

So the story that EOCO is chasing me is palpably false….. and the issue of transfers to the CoS is not illegal as is being suggested…In fact if one wants to steal money, why would one transfer the money to a statutory account held by the Chief of Staff, which can be audited at any point in time.