EOCO petitioned over alleged $4m corruption at GRIDCO

A Consultant at the Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDCO) has blown the whistle on alleged financial improprieties at the company, leading to the loss of over $4 million.

According to the whistle blower, the discrepancies resulted from over invoicing by GRIDCO officials in the purchase of 14 transformers from an Indian firm, Crompton Greaves Limited, in 2011.

Joy News has intercepted a copy of a petition sent to the Presidency and the Economic and Organized Crimes Office (EOCO) by Yaw Nsiah, the consultant.

According to the petition, Crompton Greaves Ltd was paid an amount of $4,170,330 million as the Free on Board (FOB) value of the first batch of six transformers, while GRIDCO claims to have paid $6,581,376 million, thus creating a difference of an amount of $2,411,376 million.

FOB is a trade term requiring the seller to deliver goods on board a vessel designated by the buyer.

He further alleged that there was discrepancy of $590,000 in the prices of the second batch of three transformers, apart from further discrepancies in the prices of the final batch of four.

According to the consultant, “this could only have been achieved with the active participation of officials of both GRDICO and Crompton Greaves in collusion with other public officials.”

According to the petition, “the fact that the discrepancies of $2,411,376 million and $590,000 million cited above has resulted in the unjustifiable financial loss to the Republic of Ghana cannot be over emphasized.”

Yaw Nsiah is also certain the purchase did not go through tender.

But the consultant finds it difficult to understand why GRIDCO had to contract an independent firm to do the purchase on their behalf instead of dealing directly with the Indian firm.

Yaw Nsiah was in April last year invited by EOCO to answer questions relating to investigations into the allegation, after the Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII) petitioned them, the Presidency and the Public Procurement Authority on behalf of the whistle blower.

But it is unclear what has happened to the investigations. He is demanding that EOCO makes public its report on the investigations it has conducted.

Speaking on Joy FM's Newsnight on Thursday July 18, Coordinator of the Advocacy and Legal Advice Centre of the Ghana Integrity Initiative, George Armoh called on government and other state institutions to support the whistle blower to help deal with the alleged corruption.