78 parcels? Do we know that for a fact?

Until then it was taken for granted by the whole country, including the Justice Georgina Wood Committee, that 78 parcels containing 2,340 kilogrammes of cocaine were bound for Ghana aboard a vessel, MV Benjamin.

But, when the vessel docked in Tema and was raided, law enforcement agents only found a single parcel containing 30 pieces, weighing one kilogramme each of a substance believed to be the banned narcotic drug, cocaine.

The conclusion was drawn that the remaining 2,310 kg, with an estimated American street value of $231m has been stolen. A committee was set up to investigate the whereabouts of this mind-boggling Ghana-bound consignment. The whole nation went on a monumental presumption drive that indeed the amount being mentioned has gone missing. So, the mightily embarrassing process of assuming sovereign responsibility of guilt for the purported lost consignment took shape. Not even the news of a $545 million gift from the US government through the Millennium Challenge Account could balm the collective guilt and self-bashing that Ghanaians have subjected themselves to since the news broke, and matters started to unfold at the Wood Committee.

But, based on the limited information so far released by the security agencies, there seems to be no concrete evidence supporting the widely accepted fact that (1) there was actually 78 parcels of 2,340 kilos of cocaine on that vessel; (2) by the time the ship entered our territorial waters it was still carrying over two tonnes of the narcotic substance.

The presumption, highly rebuttal, appears to be primarily based on intelligence information passed on to our local security set up by their international partners in the war against drugs. The source of that information is said to be the Americans.

But, the enthusiasm of our country to act, with absolute obedience, on the intelligence information given raises serious questions:

Have our own security agents had some solid information beyond the original information that all the drugs were on board and did in fact make it to Ghana?

If so, then why did they need a whole committee of inquiry and the anonymous submission of secret tape recordings of conversations to arrest suspects?

So far, operating on the scant evidence available, it appears the whole country is nervous and making noise over a mere presumption a presumption that paints our beloved country in the most scandalous and embarrassing kind of light.

When counsel for one of those who was to be soon arrested and accused, Kwabena "Tagor" Amaning, used the phrase "alleged 77 parcels of cocaine", he was politely told by the chairperson of the committee, Supreme Court justice Georgina Wood that it is a given fact that the 77 parcels were missing. But, who gave those facts? Since when did intelligence information become so sacrosanct as to lead a whole nation to board such a serious guilty gravy train without any substantial evidence to boot?

As argued on Joy FM's multi award-winning current affairs programme, Newsfile, Saturday, a common tactic of drug traffickers has been to volunteer information to the authorities about a particular consignment, to divert attention there only for a far bigger consignment to go through undetected.

The under-siege, guilt-bewitched Ghanaian public are entitled to know more convincing details about the consignment. For example, why was it not arrested anywhere but left to travel to Ghana? When was it noticed that 77 parcels were missing? If it was at the time that the security agents raided the vessel, then it raises more questions than it answers.

Where are the crews of the vessel? We were earlier in May told that the crew of the fishing trawler three Ghanaians and two Chinese were in custody. Have they given any information that suggests that there was indeed 78 parcels? Did that information implicate our own security agents to such an extent that only an independent committee could be trusted to find the whereabouts of the purported missing cocaine?

On April 27, 2006, the Narcotics Control Board, acting on intelligence information, intercepted the vessel, with assistance from the Ghana Navy. Did the intelligence information from the Americans or information from any informant make mention of some of the destined recipients of the consignment? If so, were any of them arrested?

If this was the destination, transit point or international warehouse for the consignment then it should be described as the height of unforgivable naivety that the authorities even chose to arrest the vessel without any notable arrest.

Normally, even when airport authorities detect cocaine in the baggage of couriers, without their knowledge, they choose the option of quietly tracking the couriers until they meet their 'handlers'. This increases the chances of the dragnet catching the big fish. But, apparently not in this case. So far there is nothing close to concrete evidence that 78 parcels were in the shipping vessel. There seems no clear evidence also that 77 parcels went missing.

The only missing cocaine that there is evidence of is the 5kg that went walkies from the keep of the Narcotics Control Board.

Interestingly, that was from the only parcel of 30kg that was found in the vessel. According to information available to The Statesman, when the vessel was raided, they counted 30 pieces from that single parcel and handed them over to an officer of the Narcotics Control Board. Who then drove straight to the house of Isaac Akuoku, Executive Secretary of the Narcotics Control Board, who has since been asked to proceed on leave. Col Akuoko then, without counting the bags, put them in the boot of his jaguar saloon car and drove them to the Holding Room for narcotics. There also it was said that the man in charge of the store did not count them.

It was not until an American drug enforcement agent visited the place to test the cocaine that it was discovered that five bags were missing.

Five people, including Col Akuoko and the interdicted head of Operations of the NCB, Ben Ndego, are expected to be charged for the missing 5kg of cocaine. As with the 2,310kg, the only evidence of its status appears to have come from ACP Kofi Boakye's evidence to the Wood Committee.

The Director-General of Operations of the Ghana Police Service, who was asked Thursday evening to proceed on leave, admitted in his testimony to the committee two weeks ago to holding a meeting in May in his house with five of the men arrested last week over the purported missing cocaine.

He said he held the meeting in his capacity as the Director-General of Police Operations to gather sensitive information as to the whereabouts of the consignment. "I decided to hold the meeting in my house because of the sensitive nature of the issue and also in the open to show that I was not having the meeting to extort something from them," he said. "I wonder how people who do not work with Narcotics Control Board get information about cocaine on the ship when NACOB was the only agency to have been informed about the presence of hard drugs on the ship," he said.

He said he had a tip-off that Alhaji Issah Abass, now on remand custody, Managing Director of a fishing company in Tema, Gazinbe Ltd, had entered MV Benjamin to take large quantities of the cocaine in the company of some police personnel and some civilians.

Alhaji Abass, the man suspected to have secretly taped the meeting in ACP Boakye's house, denied the accusation, and instead mentioned a rumour that Kofi Boakye was rather being accused of stealing the cocaine alongside him. According to ACP Boakye, he questioned the source of the rumour. Alhaji Issah said it was a friend of his by name Kwabena "Tagor" Amaning, one of the five charged last Friday for allegedly importing the 78 parcels into the country, who was said to be the source of the accusation against Kofi Boakye.

This was the chain of accusations and counter-accusations that have bedeviled the so-called missing consignment. Kofi Boakye told the Wood Committee of the meeting held at his house: "During the confrontations, it came out clear that Tagor knew something about the missing cocaine and pointed out that he had had information that Alhaji Issah had gone to take some of the cocaine from the ship."

The question is this: were all of them operating on the presumption that the intelligence report of 78 parcels being on board the ship was accurate? Or, there is more to it than that?

So far, the evidence seems far from conclusive, which makes it worrying that the whole nation should be hooked on this serious guilty tip. What is absolutely clear is that Ghana has fully established herself as a major international warehouse for hard drugs. Perhaps, this is the best opportunity to rid the nation of this tag.