FDA Boss testifies before "Cocaine C'ttee"

Accra, Aug 9, GNA - Mr Emmanuel Kyerematen Agyarko, Executive Director of the Food and Drugs Board, on Wednesday told the Justice Georgina Woode Committee investigating the alleged disappearance of part of a consignment of cocaine from a shipping vessel at Tema Harbour that he was privy to a tape that had the distinct voice of Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Kofi Boakye discussing the issue with some people.

He said he was unable to identify the other voices. Mr Agyarko, who before his present appointment was a Deputy Director of the Narcotic Control Board (NCB), was giving evidence on his involvement in the circulation of an alleged tape recording that had implicated some persons in the disappearance of cocaine from the MV Benjamin Ship in April, 2006.

Mr Agyarko said Mr Ben Ndegu, Deputy Director of the NCB, gave him the tape, which after he had listened to only about five minutes of the recording, decided that, "the highest authority must know about this" and Mr Ndegu was in agreement.

He said his first thought was to give it to the Minister of Presidential Affairs, whom he regarded as a brother and to whom he always went whenever he had a problem, "but when I went to his house I did not meet him so I proceeded to the house of the President, but I did not meet him too".
Mr Agyarko said he decided to give it to somebody in authority because he was uncomfortable with the contents of the recording. He said his decision was informed by the bad press the Government had been receiving in recent times that suggested that it condoned the dealing in drugs, especially, with the alleged involvement of a New Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament in narcotic smuggling in New York.
Mr Agyarko said he left the recording with "some operative" he trusted to pass it to the people in high authority because he had to travel to attend a meeting, a day or two after he had received the tape. He said he was, however, not sure whether the tape was passed on to the people because he did not bother to check when he came back from the trip.
In answer to a question as to whether he knew where Mr Ndegu got the recording from, Mr Agyarko said he did not know and that he did not even bother to ask what was on the tape until he listened to only a portion of it.
He said what he heard had to do with the Police arrest and the difficulty with the NACOB but he could also not tell if what was on the tape was the whole conversation or a portion of it. Mr Agyarko told the Committee that his involvement started from when he started visiting the new site offices of NACOB behind the Golden Tulip Hotel, where the Executive Director, Mr Isaac Akuako, once told him that he was working on a tape, which when completed would rope in all the drug barons in the country and he 'Kwesi Akuako would go home with a lot of contentment'.
Mr Agyarko said he left some days after this conversation to attend the World Health Assembly meeting in Aberdeen with the Minister of Health, from where they proceeded to Geneva.
Mr Agyarko said it was in Aberdeen that he had a call from somebody that his Deputy at the FDB had been seconded to the NACOB. He said he asked the reason for the secondment and was told that Col. Akuako and his Deputy Mr Ndegu had either been interdicted or asked to proceed on leave.
Mr Agyarko said when he returned from Aberdeen he went to see Col Akuako, who told him about how they had undertaken some operation with some difficulty, but succeeded in seizing only one parcel. He said Mr Akuako told him that after the operation he travelled to Benin and in his absence some five kilos of cocaine got missing in addition to the 77 parcels that were believed to have disappeared from MV Benjamin.
Mr Agyarko said it was then that Mr Akuako confirmed to him that there was a tape which he would like him (Agyarko) to listen to. He said a few days later a CD was brought to him and he listened to part of it. Sitting continues on Thursday.