My attention is drawn to a video circulating in the media purporting to be a press conference organised by the Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII) and addressed by Mrs. Mary Awelana Adda, Programmes Manager of GII. That video tells GII is in connivance with Manasseh Azure Awuni of the Multimedia Group and Joy FM to deceive the unsuspecting public and taint the image of the hard working solution driven Dr. Joseph Siaw Agyepong and his over 40 companies. No matter what you do, a slain goat can never come back to life. Manasseh you are finished in terms of reputation so stop worrying yourself in this wicked partnerships.
In that video, Mrs. Adda copied and read portions of a so-called investigative piece written by Manasseh Azure Awuni and published by myjoyonline.com and sought to believe that what was published is factual as stated by her.
As a concerned citizen with special interest in waste management I followed up to ascertain the so-called facts stated by GII in that video at the Jospong Group of Companies and the facts available hit me in the chest that GII I would have expected the hitherto respected GII to make follow ups to find out from the companies if what Manasseh had written was indeed factual but the GII did a lazy job by simply copying what the one sided Manasseh wrote and concluded that Jospong deserved Manasseh’s vilification and a possible punishment.
She disparagingly and disturbingly so, speaks of a 74 million dollars contract waste bin scandal awarded to five companies belonging to the Jospong Group of Companies involving the supply of 1,000,000, 240 litter bins and 900, 000 bin liners was inflated in excess of 31 million dollars.
Madam Adda also certainly copied and believes in that video that what Manasseh said in his piece that 98 million was paid to 11 companies under the Jospong Group to spray selected areas of the MMDAs within 20 days was true and describes it as a fact. Again she alleges that in 2016 similar contract was awarded to 10 companies of the Jospong Group worth an amount of 96 million.
Now I will like to state the facts clearly in order to educate the sleeping GII and Awelana that people and organisations who ride on the back of integrity do what is honest and fair. They do not jump into conclusion after hearing from one side and run to the press.
Fact one: Yes, there was a 74-million-dollar arrangement between Jospong and Government: Factually so, the contract was never executed and therefore no pesewa was paid to Zoomlion or its subsidiaries. I wonder how Manasseh got his figures and the lazy GII relied on that to take Jospong to the media. Question is how did Manasseh come to that conclusion then that such amount was paid to Jospong? If I were Jospong I would have made Manasseh pay dearly for such a malicious fallacy.
Again an arrangement I am told was reached between government and Zoomlion to do open spraying of selected areas in some MMDAs which was indeed executed and payment effected. Is that what is paining Manasseh to go about soliciting unjustifiable support from GII to organise this jaundiced and non-factual press conference? Well as for whether there was investigation or not and the veracity of that it can only be obtained from the police CID and it is not the duty of GII to stampede state agencies’ work using the media. Are you scared of the CID Head Quarters?
Be it as it may, once work was done I don’t know what Manasseh and his Mrs. Adda want from Jospong. The critical issue to include here is that one would want to urge GII not to lower the hitherto envious standards so established during the era of Mr. Vitus Aziim and co.
For me, I would advise that GII to set their targets right and rebrand themselves if they have anything left to brand and reinstitute the habit of research before coming out to poke their noses into unsubstantiated and wild allegations. How can somebody like respected Mrs. Adda with research background do such a porous work?
I will prove to the world why I concluded GII is either lazy, one sided or they are sleeping. As I was finding pieces of information for this piece I realised a very vital piece of information in relation to this was totally ignored in GII’s quest to judge or portray that Manasseh and Joy FM maybe right.
At the emergence of the Manasseh/Joy FM so called investigations media report titled “Robbing the Assemblies” Zoomlion and the Jospong Group of Companies reacted in a release and stated factually and blatantly that the said contract was never executed and so there were no monetary exchanges and I think that was enough to have cautioned Mrs. Addah and her now amnesia raided GII.
Let me also caution them to tread cautiously that Manasseh has a personal wicked plan against Jospong such that at every moment of time anything good happens to the JGC or its subsidiaries Manasseh gets sick and that should tell GII that their image is at stake the day they decided to close their eyes as they did in this press conference and run behind Manasseh or Joy FM for facts.
Take time and read the Jospong Group response to Manasseh and Joy FM allegations then you will agree with me that indeed there is a sinister move by them to tarnish the hard earned reputation of Dr. Joseph Siaw Agyepong and his companies.
JOSPONG GROUP OF COMPANIES RELEASE PUBLISHED BY MYJOYONLINE.COM AUGUST 31, 2017.
“Our attention has been drawn to reports on JOY FM and its other sister stations since Monday 28th August 2017, imputing wrongdoing in the award of contract to some subsidiaries of the JOSPONG GROUP with particular reference to the fact that the quoted sum of $74,040,000 is inflated. The inaccurate report carried by the Multimedia Group on its various platforms purported to be an investigation by your reporter Manasseh Azure Awuni is unfortunate.
We respond to the specific allegations as follows:
- Allegation of Inflated price
That the price is inflated is misconceived and misleading. Firstly, this agreement is a Pre Financing and Credit Sale contract. The total number of waste bins to be supplied under the initiative is 1,000,000 at a supply rate of $60 per piece (to be paid at the prevailing Bank of Ghana interbank exchange rate) plus 900,000 (nine hundred thousand) pieces of Biodegradable Bin Liners at $15.60 per piece. The total contract sum of 74,040,000 United States Dollars was to be pre financed by the companies, which therefore allowed the Government of Ghana flexibility payment terms for a period of 24 months. Definitely a cash sale has different terms as compared to a credit sale.
- Further to the production cost involved in the above, a major component of the contract is the transportation and distribution of the bins to households within the 216 districts in Ghana by the companies involved which has additional cost implications, and same was factored into the pricing.
- It should be noted, contrary to claims, the bins are durable; coming with a replacement warranty and a competitive price to the international market price.
- Allegation of payment of the contract sum.
It must be placed on record that none of the five companies has supplied any item under the contract and neither has any payment been made by the Ministry of Local Government to the said companies.
The reports and statements in the Multimedia Group, authored by Manasseh Azure Awuni, to the effect that the contract price has been inflated in excess of one hundred and thirty million Ghana cedis (GH¢130,000,000.00) is, therefore, grossly misleading and unfortunate to say the least. Clearly, there was no wrong doing in the procurement or award of the contract.
- Splashing pictures of waste bins
We wish to state categorically that the references made to waste bins in the district with pictures displayed online by Joy FM were meant to mislead the public that, because some assemblies have not distributed existing bins, there was no need for distributing the bins as required by the contract is unfortunate.
It should be noted that, The One million Bins Distribution Programme is meant to ensure that households in Ghana have bins to enhance waste management, disposal and collection in all communities. Currently, the lack of such bins in houses is leading to poor waste disposal and indiscriminate dumping of waste generated daily.
On the face of the evidence, we deem the publication in question by the Joy FM and Manaseh Azuri Awuni as malicious and calculated to tarnish the hard-won reputation of the Jospong Group, the Chief Executive and its subsidiaries.
Accordingly, we call on Joy FM and its sister stations to retract the defamatory statements made against the Jospong Group and the Chief Executive of the Jospong Group, Dr. Joseph Siaw Agyepong, within three days upon receipt of this rejoinder, failing which the company may be constrained to take any further action that it deems appropriate without further recourse to the Multimedia Group.
You may kindly contact the undersigned for further clarification
Sophia Lissah
Group Head of Communication
I reckon the company took the case to court and that case is still pending and that should have served as a caution to GII not to meddle in the matter of uncertainty. Also there are several better ways of finding information one of which is not a press release so GII using a press release to expose their incompetence on the matter speaks of a connivance with Manasseh and Joy Fm to dent the golden reputation of Jospong and the conglomerate.
By E.J.K. Badu Agyemang
