…At third day of BNI interrogation
It is certainly unpleasant for any individual to be bogged down by sudden illness, but in the case of former Chief of Staff, Mr. Kwadwo Mpiani, it was such a misfortune that saved him from another bout of marathon interrogation by the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) last Friday.
Mr. Mpiani was scheduled to meet BNI interrogators in the on-going investigations into his tenure as the Supervisory Minister of the Ghana @50 Secretariat when he was suddenly taken ill in the early morning of Friday, June 05, 2009. It would have been the third day of the Mpiani interrogation by the BNI.
He reported to his doctors about the deteriorating state of his health where after treatment, he once again submitted himself to the team of BNI interrogators. Under the circumstances the interrogation panel led by Mr. George Dogba, the Deputy Director of the BNI and one Derry, who currently acts as the Greater Accra Director of the BNI, had no option than to reschedule the interrogating meeting to today, Monday, June 08, 2009.
BNI sources disclosed to TODAY that the team could not withstand the possible mishap that its intense interrogation might have on the health conditions of the former Chief of Staff and therefore advised Mr. Mpiani to go home and get enough rest. In fact Mr. Mpiani, according to credible BNI sources, did not spend more than 30 minutes at the BNI headquarters on Friday.
Before last Friday Mr. Mpiani has been subjected to two days (last Tuesday and Wednesday) of marathon session of interrogation by veteran security operative, Gustav Adade, who has found his way back into the country's security detail after the inauguration of the NPP government and Mr. George Dogba, the deputy Director of the BNI. Mr. Mpiani spent almost 17 hours during the Tuesday interrogation.
He was released after government realized that many former functionaries of the NPP were making political capital out of the situation. Apparently it could bear with the tension that was being build up in the wake of Impiani's long interrogation.
The spontaneous thronging of the BNI headquarters where the interrogation took place by some former Ministers, former MPs and NPP supporters was so scarry that the entire country was plunged into total darkness in order to quell the growing agitation, especially amongst NPP supporters on that night.
A day after Mr. Mpiani's ordeal at the BNI, a Deputy Minister of Information, James Agyenim Boateng in an address to the media, explained that part of the long interrogation was because Mr. Mpiani refused a BNI invitation last Monday and that might have necessitated his long delay at the BNI headquarters because what should have constituted a two day questioning was carried out on last Tuesday.
But TODAY's investigations show that Mr. Mpiani had informed BNI Director, Yaw Donkor of his inability to attend the Monday meeting because he was in his hometown near Kumasi when the BNI invitation was extended to him.
One of his lawyers, Egbert Faibille Jr. told TODAY that Mr. Mpiani went to the BNI headquarters last Tuesday on his own volition without any further prompting from the BNI.
TODAY's intelligence search suggests that the order for the release of Mr. Mpiani came from the official residence of former President, Jerry John Rawlings. The former President was said to be monitoring events from the BNI headquarters which is close to his home with top security personnel-Brigadier J. Nunoo-Mensah, veteran Intelligence Operative, Gustav Adade and Col Larry Gbevlo Lartey and easily picked up the growing agitation.
The order for Mpiani's release, our sorties discovered, came from the former President and his team of other top members of the National Security.
TODAY gathered that long before his Friday condition, Mr. Mpiani has been battling with his health conditions, especially with his sight and his conditions might have been worsened by the long detention and the intense interrogation by the BNI last Tuesday and Wednesday.
Intelligence signal intercepted by TODAY, suggests that although the President has instituted a three man team to investigate further the execution of projects at the Ghana @50 Secretariat by Mr. Mpiani and Dr. Charles Yves Wereko-Brobby, the Chief Executive Officer at the Ghana @50 Secretariat, the former Chief of Staff would have been formally charged on that fateful Friday.
Presidential Spokesperson Mahama Ayariga who announced the President's decision last Wednesday told the media that notwithstanding the President's directive, the BNI will still continue with investigations into operations at the Ghana @50 Secretariat.