Agyemang Manu’s letter constitutes contract - Woyome

Alfred Agbesi Woyome, the embattled businessman facing trial for allegedly defrauding the state of Ghc51.2 million, yesterday told the court that per the opinion of Mrs Betty Mould-Iddrisu, a former Attorney General, a letter written by Mr Kwaku Agyemang Manu, former Deputy Finance Minster under the Kufuor administration, to him (Woyome) constituted a contract between him and the government.

He told the court during the continuation of his cross-examination by the state that the opinion of the former AG, which is dated and in evidence, was categorical to that effect, adding that Mrs Mould-Iddrisu came to that conclusion after consulting all the relevant people at the Ministry of Sports, Finance and the Attorney General’s Department.

But Chief State Attorney, Mrs Yvonne Attakrah Obuobisa said that the government of Ghana never contracted him to do any financial engineering and that whatever the letter or the purported opinion alluded to was based on misleading statement he (Woyome) made to the AG.

Woyome in response said that was incorrect and that up to date no one had come to show him any claim he made that was misleading.

It was also established through cross-examination that on December 19, 2005 whatever contract Waterville had with M-powapak was terminated and at the time Woyome was paid fully for all the work he did for Waterville through M-powapak.

Woyome told the court that indeed Waterville paid all sorts of monies to M-powapak for work done, even to the last job he did for them, and that even though he could not recollect the amount, he recollected that they were mostly reimbursement.

Mrs Obuobisa further inquired of Woyome that a letter written by lawyer Kwame Tetteh on behalf of Waterville stipulated claims being made by the accused, but Woyome said that the letter and the claims were different from what the Government of Ghana owed him but even that letter was overruled by another letter that was written by the Managing Director of Waterville to the AG at the time.

Earlier, Woyome told the court that he as an individual did not bid for the building of stadia for CAN 2008 and that he entered the bid on behalf of Waterville and Vamed.

He also told the court that it was true that Vamed pulled out of the CAN 2008 and that it was due to the fact that Vamed did not know Waterville and that the company they knew was Vatech, who was to handle the technical aspect of the project.

But Mrs Obuobisa told him that that was not the case, and that the evidence before the court was that “Vamed wrote a letter to Yaw Osafo Marfo, former Minster for Youth and Sports, stating that their principal reason for pulling out of the project was that they did not have the expertise and the interest in the construction of stadia.”

Woyome then agreed that indeed a letter of that sort was written to Mr Osafo Marfo but was written when the purported cancellation of the contract happened.

The case has been adjourned to today for continuation.