‘Whistleblower’ screams from Lagos, but company denies him

A 50-year old Ghanaian, Fred Kofi Lagbo who wants to be regarded as a whistleblower in an alleged $2million Ghana Ports & Harbours Authority (GPHA) contract fraud is appealing to the president for clemency and promise that he will not be arrested should he come back to Ghana to help with investigations.

Mr. Lagbo, describing himself as a director of KF94 limited, local agents of Chinese company ZPMC has confessed to an alleged deal he says involved the bloating of an original contract worth $14.6million by $2million to be shared among a number of people.

Speaking on Radio Gold over the weekend, Fred Lagbo mentioned President Kufuor, Presidential Adviser Gabby Nketia, GPHA boss Ben Owusu Mensah, some board members of the GPHA, one Menson Osei Kufuor and Kwaku Eshun as those who were going to benefit from the booty.

But Managing Director of KF94, Kwaku Eshun has in an exclusive interview with the dailyEXPRESS denied Lagbo’s claims insisting among others that there was never a decision, plot or plan to ‘pad’ any contract sum. He also denied ever attending any meetings with Lagbo and never discussed any decision or plan to pay anybody from a $2million booty.

“These are serious allegations but let me say this that I want to look at the facts as I have stated them. The man is claiming that there was a bargain of 2 million dollars; he has to answer to whatever he is saying. I don’t want to get into issues with Kofi Lagbo and all that. I can understand people being interested in the question of corruption, because this is a country for all of us. The issues are on the ground. GPHA have stated their case as to what really went into the contract. If there was a 2million dollar padding, the 2million that I know of is the 2million which was the cost of financing the project over the 10 years. If this is called padding, I don’t know where he is getting that information from.”

“In all the dealings of KF94 regarding not just this contract but all business that KF94 has been involved in, I am the sole and only person who has been involved in it. I am responsible for everything that KF94 has done. Mr. Kofi Lagbo was a dormant director of the company. Totally dormant, totally not involved in anything that KF94 has done, not just on this issue. He is not involved in the running of KF94.”

Currently domiciled in Nigeria where he fled after the police started looking for him for an alleged case of harassment and blackmail, Fred Lagbo according to his own account, thinks he has been denied his share of the alleged $2m.

According to him, he was conned into believing that the original plan to ‘pad’ the contract sum by $2m has been discarded until he watched a news item on Tv3 that announced that the cost of supply and installing the container cranes at the Tema port was $16.3m and not $14.6m.

The contract was awarded to Shangai Zhenhua Port Machinery Co, Ltd (ZPMC) in 2003 for the supply and installation of container cranes by a Chinese firm. This same contract and the suspected inflation of the contract sum is the subject of a court case filed against the Gye Nyame Concord by the GPHA and its Director General.

Mr. Lagbo who is now referred to as a whistleblower insists that an increase in the contract sum from $14.6m to $16.3m confirms that the original decision to bloat the figure did take place.

KF94 Managing Director, Kwaku Eshun will however have none of that, explaining that he as local agent for ZPMC presented a bid for $14.7m and won the contract based on that figure. He corroborated the story of the GPHA regarding how the contract sum short up to $16.3m, explaining however that he was present in China when the contract was amended to include additional spares.

The GPHA has told a press conference that the original contract was for $14.6m but had to be increased to $15.2m to allow for the addition of extra spares.

“Six months after signing the contract we were advised by our contracted resident engineers at ZPMC that it will be beneficial to GPHA if we took advantage and increased the length of the booms of the ship to shore cranes. The cost of modification was $1,161,000 bringing the total final contract price to $16,381,000” they claim.

Mr. Eshun also explained that as part of the bid they submitted a financing proposal that would have provided the GPHA with a 10-year period within which to pay up the $14.6m.

“When we wrote the letter to them, we stated the cost of that facility at 2million dollars, and it’s amazing. I mean ZPMC is not a bank. They are a manufacturing concern. If they are going to provide you with the facility, they have to get it from some financial institution and they have to pay for it. Now I don’t see how anybody could assume that that 2million that was being passed on to GPHA as the cost of the financing was something that anybody could call a cut as was being claimed. That it was padding and all that” he explained.

Fred Lagbo reportedly fled to Nigeria after sending text messages threatening, harassing and attempting to blackmail the GPHA boss and Kwaku Eshun. GPHA Director General Ben Owusu Mensah at his press conference said Fred before he fled, sent an emissary to beg him explaining that he (Ben Owusu Mensah) was not the target.

He fled to Nigeria after some of his text messages were used as basis for a police complaint. Mr. Eshun told dailyEXPRESS that Fred has been a friend since childhood but cannot explain why he would make up stories about an alleged corrupt deal.

dailyEXPRESS: Would you be able to hazard a guess as to why Fred is doing this? KE: Stan, the name is Stan right? Eh! if you were in my position you will sit and wonder because as I said, I don’t want to go into personal issues but the main issue for me now is, I can’t even think about myself, but if the man could go to this extent, then I don’t know what the man would do. I can only think about, for now, the people involved, the president; it’s amazing. But these issues are for me clarified as I have tried to do, so that the so-called padding based on which all these other prepositions are taking place, is a complete elusion.

dailyEXPRESS: Did you make any promise to him that if this contract goes through he might get some 10,000 dollars or something that later on did not come through that probably got him incensed or incited in anyway?

KE: That was a man I have known since my infancy. I understand the questions you are asking, but even if my friend is in trouble and I decide to help him, and I couldn’t do it; I shudder to think that the person will target me in the process, tarnish the image of so many other people; its amazing and I really don’t want to go into that area because that is something that I have to ponder on and take my lessons from. But the main thing there for me is to do with the substance of the issues.

dailyEXPRESS: Fred made this other allegation that he was dropped off along the line because he told Messrs Nketia and Benson that there is a 2 million dollar padding somewhere. That was where you got infuriated and pushed him off the discussions.

KE: That’s what he says? I mean err that’s what he is saying. I am not even interested in discussing Kofi Lagbo per se. This is what he is saying, and to even answer him; Kofi Lagbo for me is not somebody I even want to say anything in that direction to give any credence to it. Honestly, you say that I am dodging the issues, but I feel that to even answer that, it’s difficult for people on the outside to think of their minds. But I can only say that I will take my lessons from this. How can I talk about the 2 million dollar free gift which doesn’t exist? This is what I am asking you to think about. Where is the free gift? Look at the proposals that I believe are before you. Where in lies the said $2m.