‘I didn’t take Martha Bissah’s money’

“Why would I want to take Martha Bissah’s money?”

These are the exact words of retained President of the Ghana Athletics Association reacting to previous allegations that he wanted to take an amount of Ten Thousand Ghana Cedis (GHC 10,000) given to Ghana’s first ever gold medalist at the Youth Olympic Games in Neijin, Martha Bissah, by President John Dramani Mahama days after returning from the International athletics fiesta.

It had been alleged by Martha’s mother that the President of the Association wanted to take the money from her daughter, which she kicked against, but Professor Francis Duodo has flatly denied the claim.

In an interview with sportscrusader.com after he was declared victorious in the Presidential election of the association, Professor Francis Duodo quizzed, “Why would I want to take Martha Bissah’s money?”

In further explanation, he said, “When we came back from the Commonwealth Games in Scotland, she gave me her allowances to keep for her until she returns from Neijin.

Interestingly, I returned those allowances totalling three thousand five hundred dollars ($3500) to her the very Monday morning we left for the Flagstaff House to meet His Excellency, President John Dramani Mahama. So do you think I will give her $3,500 and then take GHC 10,000 from her? It does not make sense. I never made any move to take any money from her.”

“In any case, I only asked her parents to open an account and deposit about $2500 into it towards the girl’s education as we try to secure her a scholarship so that if we are unable to secure the sponsorship, she can enter the university without difficulty. So I don’t know where those stories started coming from”, he added.