Who are SADA, Dan Saaka’s Plus-One Deceiving?

I was filled with rage and resentment after patiently reading a Ghana News Agency (GNA) story Ghanaweb had carried on Thursday, 8th May 2014 with the headlined “SADA, Plus-One to start butternut squash export to Brazil.”
In the midst of the rage, what came to my mind was that this country is gradually moving to a point where corruption and outright stealing of state funds has become part and parcel of our tradition and customs. Financial wrongdoers do not only go scot-free but are also glorified and rewarded by those who are supposed to punish them.
In the said story I am talking about, Mr. Sadat Anwar, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Plus-One Investment Limited stated that “The Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA) and Plus-One Investment Limited have found another potential market in Brazil and would soon start exporting butternut squash to the South American country.

The product has enjoyed good market in Birmingham City in the United Kingdom, a source of motivation for companies investing in the production of the crop in northern Ghana to explore other potential markets in order to increase their export to the international market.”
The main thrust of the above story is that Plus-One Investment Limited is doing well contrary to an audit report in the recent publication by Joy Fm’s Manasseh Azure Awuni that the company is in distress and that the project is not viable. The audit report therefore asked the company to refund the GHC2, 771890 (c27 billion) back to SADA with interest at the prevailing market rate.
For avoidance of doubt, I wish to quote the audit report “Our audit discovered that management paid GHC38, 796 (almost c380m) and GHC2, 771890 (almost c27 billion) to Kukobila Farms Limited and Plus One Investment Limited respectively to engage in the cultivation and exportation of butter nut squash.”
“Management however failed to produce records on the number of tonnage of the butter nut squash the companies had harvested and exported and the sale of the butter nut squash. This practice can be recipe for financial malfeasance.
“As a result, we could not ascertain the commercial viability of the project.
“Management’s unwillingness to enhance internal revenue generation to support the activities of SADA accounted for the irregularity.
“We recommend that the companies be made to refund the amount granted to them together with interest at the current commercial bank lending rate.
“With the agreement with Plus One Investment Limited, management gave such a concession to the company for the cultivation of a crop which is seasonal in nature and had been fully harvested and exported. At the time of our audit the company had not any refund to SADA.” The audit concluded.
The Plus-One Limited itself in the words of the same Mr. Sadat in an interview with Joy Fm when they were serializing the SAD SADA STORY, said they were able to pay about GHc60,000 (c600m) out of the GHC2.7m (c27 billion) last year to SADA.
So, granted that the whole c27 billion is a loan as is being claimed by the management of SADA and the repayment period is five years, does it make economic sense that Plus-One was able to make a repayment of only c600m in one year? So assuming it should even be able to pay c1 billion each year for the remaining four years, over c22 billion will still be outstanding by the end of the fifth year.
We are not even told how much interest Plus-One is supposed to pay on the whole c2.7billion over the five year period. So, looking at the issues critically, one has nothing to say than to side with the position of the audit report that the project is not viable and so there is the need for an immediate refund of the c27 billion back to SADA to undertake much more viable projects for the poor people of the North.
I am amazed by the lackluster attitude of the state towards this SADA matter and it was frightening that these crooks are still throwing their weights about as if there is no law in the land that can deal with them.
As I said in my earlier publications, the Project Coordinator of the said Plus-One Investment Limited, Mr. Dan Saaka Ahmed is the brain behind this rot called butter nut squash project. He has a very questionable background since his days at EDIF where he led a similar project in the North to grow mango plantations to ward off the desertification that is staring the regions in the face. After financially messing up the project, EDIF terminated his appointment and from nowhere, he resurfaced through the help of friends, deceived the Gilbert Iddi-led SADA management and got this whopping amount. His sudden opulent lifestyle after pocketing this huge amount from SADA attests to this. He bought several houses and luxurious cars within a spate of six months in 2013 while some of his workers were not paid for six months.
I have interacted with several of the workers of Plus-One here in Tamale and some of them are ready to testify and give more information to any state investigative agency that requires it. They have so much information about the deception that went on in this deal. Some of the details they narrated us me are horrifying.
I and my colleagues in this SADA advocacy exercise in the northern region were monitoring with trepidation when the Gilbert Iddi-led management was sinking this huge amount of money in this company late 2012 and early 2013 and we were asking ourselves then what personal interest he had in this company.
After doing a thorough background checks on the subject matter, we are planning to come out on some of the things we have gathered in this financial rampage that went on with the poor people’s money in the name of butter nut squash. Our activism on SADA is based on conviction and the desire to ensure that the northern regions and the savannah zones are not short changed by any individuals, or groups or even regimes, now or in the future.
My humble advice to the current management of SADA is that they should learn their lessons and re-focus on the core mandate of the Authority of providing infrastructure and social amenities to the people of the North and the rest of the Savanna zones. These are areas where there are no proper hospitals and people die easily from curable, treatable and preventable diseases. Again, students in their second cycle institutions perform poorly because of lack of educational infrastructure and teachers. The roads in the various districts and across the five regions under SADA are not motorable. There is massive water crisis, especially during dry season and people in these regions in most instances compete with animals for drinking water. These and many others are the sectors SADA has to support and not pushing scarce resources into the hands of crooks whose sole interests is to satisfy their greedy and selfish interests.


SHAKUR NURUDEEN MAHAMA
Nuru2014mahama@gmail.com
TAMALE