Business News of Tuesday, 7 June 2005

Source: Palaver

Who Owns ?West Airport Hospitality Co. Ltd??

Palaver -- WE have for some time now been trying to find out the shareholders, Directors, address and other details of the ?West Airport Hospitality Company Limited?, a limited liability Company registered under the Companies Code of Ghana. We have not been successful.

We have paid the required statutory fees and checked at the Registrar-Generals? Department, the IRS, CEPS, Ghana Investments Promotion Centre, and virtually every Government Ministry, Department or Agency as well as public sector institution where one would expect to find information on an active, thriving Company. So far, no luck.

No files, no particulars, no details of whatever kind on the Company could be traced in any of these places. It is as if the Company did not exist and has never exited, a ghost Company.

Yet we are aware that this Company is very much alive, and has only recently been involved in a very expensive hotel acquisition deal.

So if the Government agencies cannot or will not tell us who owns ?West Airport Hospitality Co. Ltd, can the owners of the Company themselves oblige us?

This is not the first time that ?Ghana Palaver? has drawn a blank in our bid to find out information on certain Companies formed since the NPP Government has been in power.

When some time ago, we published some stories about some Companies with ?Link? in their names and were taken to court, we could not put up a satisfactory defence because all the files on all the ?Link?-linked Companies had ?disappeared? from the Registrar-Generals Department.

When we also wanted ?further and better particulars? on the ?Metro Mass Transport Company Limited? from the Registrar-Generals? Department, we again drew a blank. The file and all the documentation on the Company had ?disappeared? from the Registrar-Generals? Department.