BUSINESS GUIDE has gathered that the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service has commenced investigations into alleged shady deals at Precious Minerals Marketing Company Limited (PMMC) during the tenure of Abradu-Otoo.

According to the newly-appointed Managing Director (MD) Dr Kwadwo Opare-Hammond, “Through the non-repatriation of the proceeds, Ghana lost heavily but individuals, especially foreigners made money.

“$2.3 billion of gold was exported through PMMC in 2016, but not a single dollar was repatriated back to the country as required by the law,” he added.

Earlier at the inauguration of a new board of PMMC by the Deputy Minister of Lands and Natural Resources, Barbara Gyasi, Dr Opare-Hammond said that “the company we are taking over can best be described as one that is in “comatose.”

Members of the new board include Samuel Ashong-Narh, Kofi Dametia, Lawyer Komla Onny, Nana Kwesi Awuah, Emefa Obro-Adibo, Mavis Nkansah Boadu, Alhaji Musah Fuseini Cudjoe and Dr Opare-Hammond.

Dr. Opare-Hammond’s assertions appears to be in line with this paper’s independent investigations in 2016, which revealed that foreigners, especially Indians and Chinese, had allegedly formed a syndicate at PMMC with their Ghanaian counterparts to export gold through PMMC under the watch of Mr Abradu-Otoo without repatriating the proceeds to Ghana as required by law.

BUSINESS GUIDE’s earlier investigations revealed that there was a smuggling syndicate in the sector, majority of whom allegedly had links with Mr. Abradu-Otoo at the time and reportedly exported gold through PMMC without repatriating the funds.

A certain Indian man in Ghana, according to unconfirmed reports at the time, was allegedly making nearly $23 million monthly from such ‘fraudulent and questionable’ deals at the expense of the state.

PMMC has been noted as one of the five 18 state-owned enterprises that made losses in 2016 despite the huge gold export.

The company recorded consistent losses throughout the period, making it impossible to pay dividends or surplus to the government, according to the 2016 Annual Aggregate report on State Owned Enterprises.

Its revenue was on a steady decline, significantly by 83 percent from GHc136 million to GHc23 million in 2016.

‘Fictitious Companies’

It appears that most of companies that PMMC dealt with under the watch of its former MD, George Abradu-Otoo, are ‘fictitious.’

This is because PMMC and the Bank of Ghana (BoG) are accordingly unable to trace most of the companies involved in the 2016 gold export.

Dr. Opare-Hammond, speaking to Citi Breakfast Show, said the lost revenue on the exported gold came to the attention of the BoG when it complained that an alarming amount of gold was shipped in 2016.

According to him, “None of the companies that shipped gold through PMMC returned the money into the country.”

He alleged that “there are about 145 companies in question, and the BoG was asked to look into the companies’ banking details, but it looks like up to date, they have not even been able to trace the bank accounts of some of these companies.”

Suspicion

The current MD indicated that he suspects a great deal of smuggling in the sector, and the PMMC would cooperate with the security agencies to help it stem the tide.

“We suspect there is a lot of smuggling of gold out of this country, and that is one of the things we want to do as a new management. We want the collaboration of the security agencies to ensure that no gold leaves this country without passing through the appropriate channel.”

“There are a lot of foreigners who are not supposed to be part of the small-scale sector when it comes to gold, but we are told that many of them have found themselves right in the towns where we do mining…

“You go to the field and you are told that quite a number of them go hiding in all kinds of places and buy gold from the galamseyers, as well as some of the small-scale operators.”

Suspension

The BoG has since suspended the PMMC from shipping gold out of the country.

Dr Opare Hammond said the BoG was “really upset with this situation we came to find in the PMMC… as we speak now, the PMMC cannot export gold from what happened previously.”

Most of Ghana’s gold exports go to the United Arab Emirates and India, with Israel and Switzerland also serving destination for Ghana’s gold on a small scale.

Meanwhile, Mr Abradu-Otoo told BUSINESS GUIDE that the allegations are untrue, describing them as “nonsense.”