Tracing Osafo Maafo?s Award ....

The Ghanaian Finance Minister, Yaw Osafo-Maafo, is supposed to be the award winner of Africa?s Finance Minister of the year 2004. The award (or lack of it) has generated a considerable amount of controversy, ever since it hit the newsstands in early October.

On October 6 2004, the Ghana News Agency (GNA), Daily Graphic and the GhanaHomePage (ghanaweb.com) reported:

On October 9 2004, The Palaver, an opposition weekly, cast doubt on the authenticity of the award:

On October 11, The Lens newspaper, threw some more cold water on the award. According to the NDC-leaning paper, Kwesi Pratt - editor of the Insight newspaper ? told listeners on Peace 104.3FM that

Given these controversies, and going by the recent advice of the Ghana's high commisioner to UK to properly verify stories, Ghanaweb decided to launch its own investigation into affair.

It was daunting task, much like chasing a mirage, underlining the extreme difficulties in trying to verify stories with Ghanaian officials. We requested confirmation of the purported award from the following Government institutions and we present the results of our findings

• Ministry of Information: One of the highest-ranking official at the ministry promised to get back to us with information, after a phone request. That was seven days ago, and we are still waiting.

• Ministry of Finance: A ?secretary?, who answered the phone call, clearly had no knowledge about the award. She promised to get back to us. That was seven days ago. Several attempts to contact the ministry, after the initial contact, was futile because the line was either busy or nobody picked the phone.

• Office of the President: An email request on Thursday 14 October has not yet been replied.

• Ghana?s High Commission in UK: An email request, on Tuesday 12 October 2004, has still not been replied.

• Ghana?s Embassy in USA: A high-ranking official promised to get back with some information. That was 7 days ago. At the time of going to press, nothing had been received

Having exhausted government institutions, we tried other possible sources.

• New York branch of the NPP: Osafo-Maafo?s party had no knowledge of the award and rather sent us this article Osafo Maafo ?Please Say Yes Or No Yourself.

• World Bank: The only organization that answered to our email request. This is what we received:
  ?Sorry, this wasn't anything the World Bank arranged, to my knowledge.? - Damian S. Milverton (Media relations)

• EUROMONEY: A visit to the website of EUROMONEY, the organization which is supposed to have organized the award ceremony in Washington DC drew a blank. Its awards page did not mention any Finance ministers? award, much less one conferred on the Ghanaian minister. A request for information from euromoney via email has not yet been replied.

• SIL Visitor: A Ghanaian on the Ghanaweb Forum - SIL - after reading this story, provided a link to the award www.emergingmarkets.org - The headline is "African Finance Minister Of The Year: Yaw Osafo-Maafo, Ghana", but the article fails to mention that Osafo-Maafo was "voted the 2004 African Finance Minister of the Year", neither does it state where and when the award ceremony took place.

We at the Ghana Home Page (ghanaweb.com) have done our bit. One would now expect that Yaw Osafo-Maafo would be the best person to come out with a statement to clear the air since the story has generated a lot of interest.

NOTE From EDITOR: Our investigation does NOT, in any way, prove the finance minister was not bestowed the award. It however, points out the difficulty in getting information from government institutions.