The Weekend Statesman

"Did Rawlings confess?" asks the Weekend Statesman in a front page lead headline. The paper says the allegation by the Nigerian "Post Express" that the late Nigerian military ruler, General Sani Abacha, paid President Jerry Rawlings a personal sum of 5 million dollars through former National Security boss, Ismail Gwarzo, has opened "a can of worms," that promises to engulf the entire West African sub-region. President Rawlings, the paper says, has posted a rebuttal and his Foreign Minister, Mr Victor Gbeho, has also challenged the veracity of the allegation. According, to the Weekend Statesman, highly privileged Osu Castle snippets tells a different story. The paper quotes the snippets as saying that when the story first broke, all hell also broke loose as the Minister of National Security, Mr. Kofi Totobi Quakyi, took over the damage control crisis meeting to manage what he is alleged to have confessed as a damaging development. It says through his intervention, a hurriedly organised inner cabinet meeting was convened with Mr Gbeho and a handful of others tasked to work out an appropriate response. The Weekend Statesman says after a subdued, brain-storming session on the issue, a decision was taken to flatly deny the allegation which was subsequently dismissed as "outrageous" by the Foreign Ministry.