Chancellor of the University of Cape Coast, Sir Samuel Esson Jonah, has bemoaned the lack of understanding by Ghanaians of his role when he was Chief Executive Officer of Ashanti Gold Limited (ASHGold).

According to Sam Jonah, Ghanaians say he did not do enough for Obuasi because they think the had the power to do whatever he wanted as the CEO of ASHGold.

“It bothers me that I am so misunderstood in that sense. First of all, when you say I should have done more for Obuasi, I was an employee, I was using other people’s money including the government, the government was the biggest shareholder before we became public the country has 65 percent of the company.

“I was the fund manager and so when they say I should have done more for Obuasi, I think that people misunderstand the role that the Chief Executive of a company does. You do not have the freedom and the authority to do what you like,” he said in a GTV interview monitored by GhanaWeb.

The chancellor and businessman added that despite his limitation, he was able to come up with a plan to bring some development to Obuasi.

“However, because of my commitment to my sustainability … I made sure that I made the case to the company. I was brought up in Obuasi and apart from the mines, the only house with electricity was my house, we had a generator when I was a kid. We did not have standing water in homes, you had to go and fetch water.

“When I became Chief Executive in 1896, I and my team came up with a plan for rehabilitation and modernisation of Obuasi and we worked closely with the architecture department of Tech (Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology) and the town planning department and it was accepted by the company and we did the roads we installed strict lights, we had three major dams constructed and everybody in Obuasi had water, we modernised schools, we expanded the hospital,” he said.

Sir Sam Jonah is the executive chairman of Jonah Capital, an equity fund based in Johannesburg, and is considered one of Ghana's richest men.

Source Ghanaweb