Telcos fingered in Subah/GRA Ghc144m Saga

The Minister of Communication, Dr. Edward Omane Boamah and Chief Executive of the Telecom Chamber, Mr. Kwakye Sakyi Addo, have been accused of conniving with a disgruntled employee of Subah Infosolutions Limited to lead a smear campaign against the company to achieve varying personal interests that deny the state of valuable amount of revenue.

Apparently, telecom companies operating in the country are reported to be against Subah Infosolutions’ mandate to enforce the Communications Service Tax Act, Act 754 of 2008, which include monitoring the communications service tax returns filed by the telecos because it denied them the opportunity to shortchange the state in terms of tax.

A reliable source who spoke to this reporter on condition of anonymity said, Mr. Sakyi Addo, obviously acting at the behest of the Telecos and Dr. Omane Boamah, who is reported to have had a brush with the Chief Executive of Zoomlion Group of Companies, the mother company of Subah Infosolutions at the time he was deputy Minister of Environment Science and Technology, in order to find ways of getting rid of the communications service project and to show Mr. Joseph Siaw Agyapong, owner of Infosolutions where power lies, connived with some media personnel to damage the company.

Insiders say the minister’s schemes against the company were also not unconnected with the internal turf war within the ruling NDC government.

Chief Executive of Zoomlion, Mr. Joseph Siaw Agyapong, over the weekend confirmed to a select group of media practitioners of being the owner of Subah Infosolutions, he however, denied his company engaged in anything fraudulent.

Though the Minister has flatly denied the allegations, The Al-Hajj gathered that a disgruntled worker at the Zoomlion Group of Companies who recently left the firm took away with him some vital documents which is aiding them and with the support of friends in the media, to embark on a crusade to portray Subah Infosolutions as an entity neck deep in corrupt activities.

“I have never had a brush with the Chief Executive of Zoomlion…the communications ministry does not collect taxes, so how can I meddle in such affairs? I’m not a businessman, I was not trained to do business so I will not front for any company,” Dr. Omane Boamah told The Al-Hajj when reached for his view.

Attempts to get Mr. Kwakye Sakyi Addo’s side proved futile as he was said to be locked up in a meeting.

Subah Infosolutions Ltd was contracted in 2010 by the Ghana Revenue Authority to provide telecommunication traffic monitoring to ensure that they paid the required tax charged on phone calls.

In order to do this, Subah Infosolutions asked that it linked its system to that of the telecos, this the telecom companies resisted on the account that officials at the company will be listening to conversations, and reading messages of subscribers.

This restrained Subah Infosolutions from effectively satisfying its full mandates as contained in a contract signed between the company and the GRA. As a result, recent media reports suggested that the GRA paid the company Gghc144m for work it lacked the expertise to do.

Indeed, available records show that when Subah Infosolutions Ltd started the monitoring albeit not effective, the average monthly revenue jumped from Ghc19m to an unprecedented Ghc40m, an indication that prior to the monitoring, the telecom companies have over the years not paid the required tax, hence GRA’s low revenue.

On the inability of Subah Infosolutions Ltd to effectively satisfy the terms of the contract, the Commissioner General of the GRA, Mr. George Blankson, blamed it on resistance from the Telecos, he told Joy FM, an Accra-based radio station.

Group legal officer of Zoomlion, Lawyer Kwame Gyan, also in an interview with a newspaper insisted that his client has done nothing illegal, claiming that Subah Infosolutions under its agreement with GRA was expected to hit a certain threshold before they receive payment.