Leebda Corporation exists - Selormey

A former Deputy Minister of Finance, Victor Selormey on Thursday July 5, told a Fast Track High Court in Accra that Leebda Corporation of Texas was duly registered and, therefore, exists.

Selormey said Leebda Corporation was registered in April 1995 in the State of Texas.

The former Deputy Minister, who was opening his defence in the Court Computerisation Project case, said the corporation was registered in the name of Law, Economics, Engineering, Business and Development Associates.

Selormey is charged with conspiracy with Dr Frederick Owusu Boadu, a Ghanaian consultant in the United States, to have fraudulently cause the loss of 1.3 million dollars to the state and defrauding by false pretences.

He has pleaded not guilty and is on a 1.5 billion-cedi bail, with two sureties to be justified.

The court is presided over by Justice Sam G. Baddoo, an Appeal Court Judge sitting with additional responsibility as a High Court Judge.

Selormey, led in evidence by his counsel, Mr Barimah Manu and Mr Kwaku Baah, said the Legal Sector Advisory Committee invited six short listed companies including Leebda Corporation, Owusu Agyapong and Company and VMS International to have discussions on the contract.

According to Selormey, the Legal Sector Co-ordinating Committee which was basically set up to oversee the court computerisation project submitted that a joint company, Leebda Corporation and Owusu Agyapong Company came out as the best bidder.

He said the committee subsequently invited the two companies for negotiations.

At this point the accused tried to tender a copy of the negotiation document in evidence, but the Director of Public Prosecution, Mr Osafo Sampong, opposed it.

Selormey explained that he asked for the original to be sent, but he was told that it was impossible to do so.

Defence Counsel said the document was notarised, it was sworn, and that there was a stamp affixed on it from the County Clerk of Texas in the United States.

Counsel also reiterated that it was denied an earlier request for Dr Boadu's evidence to be taken on commission.

The DPP argued that the document was not authenticated and that there should be a seal embossed on it.

He said the document should have come from a company and not Dr Boadu. "We maintain that Leebda does not exist and therefore the document should not be entertained".

Ruling on the submission, the court said it has already told defence counsel that it did not have the power to instruct for the evidence from far away Texas, which is not within the jurisdiction of the court.

Justice Baddoo said section 161 of the Evidence Decree states that: "official document must be signed and sealed by a diplomatic personnel."

He also cited Section 149 of the Evidence Decree, which states that the document could only be tendered by an official of a business company and, therefore, rejected the verbal application by counsel to tender the document.

Selormey, who said he was familiar with the private sector development project, told the court that it was to address specific problems and bottlenecks pertaining to certain public institutions, which provided service to the private sector.

Selormey said there were six components of the court computerisation project. They included the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSRI), which was designed to commercialise research in development activities and the EMPRETEC designed to help small and medium scale enterprises in management and accounting services to enhance their businesses.

He said the Ghana Standard Board (GSB) was designed to commercialise its services to obtain international standards, the Ministry of Environment, Science and Technology was to establish a design centre to help small and medium scale enterprises to improve upon the design and quality of their products so as to make them more acceptable to the international market.

The accused said the Legal Sector Component was designed to conduct six studies on various aspects of the legal sector, production and dissemination of legal information, and electronic courtroom recordings.

Selormey said he negotiated the contract in Ghana and in Washington with the International Development Association. He also signed the contract on behalf of Ghana.

He said the contract sum of the project was 820,000 dollars for a year.

The Project Manager was Mr Paul Asemeni of the Legal Sector of the Ministry of Finance who co-ordinated the affairs of the contract.

Selormey said there were two project managers during the course of the project between 1995 and 1998.

He added that Mr Asemeni left for further studies in 1998 and while waiting to appoint a new manager, one Ken was appointed without his knowledge to manage the project. He got to know and, therefore, asked him to hand over to the Chief Director, until the new Project Manager, Mr Frank Aborkliwah was appointed.

He said the project ended last month.

According to Mr Selormey, the Ministry of Finance supervised the project and it has created more user-friendly development for the private sector and to promote it as the engine of growth.

The former deputy minister said when Leebda won the bid it approached the World Bank to discuss the project with Mr Patrick Conolly, Project Co-ordinator of the Word Bank, of the bank's interest in implementing the result of the study.

He said the World Bank informed Leebda that its roles could not permit it to accept both the study and the implementation of the contract.

Selormey said this was communicated to Mr Asemeni in Accra who also conveyed the message in a letter to Leebda.

Selormey said Leebda opted to wait for the implementation stage and the choice was communicated to Mr Asemeni in a letter, adding that the contract was to last for five months.

He denied that he did not authorise the payment on the contract of the study at the ECOBANK.

He said he was frustrated by the slow process of the implementation of the project and that various missions from the World Bank had complained about the speed and warned that the project would be cancelled unless the rate of implementation was quickened.

The accused said the whole project was to last for three years and that he had to fight to get an extension because the nature of the implementation was such that the project deserved to be extended.

He said at the same time there were resources under the Trade and Investment Programme (TIP) provided by the United States Government. He therefore discussed it with the then Finance Minister, Mr Kwame Peprah and the then Trade Minister, Mr Dan Abodakpi, who decided that some of the funds could be used in the context of creating favourable environment for the private sector.

The former minister described the project as designed to boost foreign investment and promote trade, especially in the non-traditional export.

He said at the end of the project, there was an outstanding of six million dollars left in the TIP account.

According to him, there was no provision as to what such money should be used for. It was, therefore, decided by his minister that the funds should continue to be held under a separate account to be used for other projects that would be beneficial to the private sector.

He added that the money would also assist policies and institutions in both the private and public sectors.

Accused said the Customs, Excise and Preventive Service was given some of the money for the duty draw back system to exporters, while the Ghana Export Promotion Council was given some of the resources for exporters in export contract documentation and packaging.

He said the Investment Promotion Centre was given resources for use for investment promotion activities, the Trade Fair Authority was also given some resources for the construction of new pavilion, while the Ministries of Trade and Finance were given resources for logistics support. Some of the money was also allocated to address bottlenecks within the legal judicial sector.

Selormey said they received proposal from Leebda to do a turnkey project as part of the court computerisation project.

He said the turnkey project involved the conversion of legal materials like Ghana Law Reform documents, status and indexes into computer readable forms.

He said another component of the turnkey project was the purchase of hardware while the other aspect is the training to be given to lawyers and also the creation of a central database within the premises of the High Court in Accra.

He said the system would provide easy access for legal material for research, and this would help to quicken the pace on delivery of judgement and enhance confidence of the business community.

Hearing continues on Monday, July 9.