Ministry of Trade denies blackmail tag on Minister

The Ministry of Trade on Thursday denied claims by a private newspaper that the minister, Dr Kofi Apraku has been involved in blackmail during negotiations for a fishing boat for a businesswoman.

A statement signed by Mrs Rebecca Ackwonu, Public Relations Officer, said the "highly offensive" headline alleging blackmail is not reflected anywhere in the body of the story, the memorandum or minutes of a meeting that the newspaper referred to.

"...This affirms that the story is politically motivated and aims at damaging the minister's reputation. "It is unfortunate that Mr Kofi Coomson should allow himself to be used as a hatchet man in this way."

The statement gave a history of how the minister became involved in helping the businesswoman, Nana Ofei Nkansah in negotiations with a Dutch ship building company, Damen Shipyards. It said Dr Apraku raised the problem when the Dutch Minister of Foreign Trade was in Accra with a business delegation.

The statement said a representative of the Dutch company who was on the Delegation, wanted to know about guaranteeing of loans to the small and medium enterprises and Dr Apraku told him that as the facility had not become operational at the time of the meeting, he would provide him with better information when the proposal was fully developed.

"The Minister's pre-occupation at the meeting at the Damen's offices in the Netherlands therefore was to provide the promised information.

"The Minister's presence in the Netherlands was an official visit and not just to accompany Nana Ofei Nkansah to meet Damens Shipyards as has been alleged. The visit to Damens was just one of the activities on the minister's programme during the visit."

The statement said the Ministry of Trade had been dealing with the businesswoman for 10 years and in 1998, the ministry wrote on behalf of her company to the Ministry of Finance requesting financial assistance for the purchase of a standard fishing vessel.

It said the meeting with Damens, which mentioned the government’s support for the private sector by way of loan guarantees and the four projects in the fisheries sector for which they had appointed Nana Ofei Nkansah as the agent, did not mention anything about Masai Agency.

"It must be noted that it is the policy of the Government to travel with businessmen and businesswomen whenever the need arises for advocacy purposes.

"The president himself has set the example and the normal thing is for government officials to stay at the same hotel with the businessman or woman that they travel with.

"The assistance offered by the Minister to Nana Ofei Nkansah is available to any businessman or businesswoman who requests such assistance from the Ministry or indeed from any minister in President John Kufuor's team."