NPP Strategy Lands On Ground Zero

The strategy of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to use, in their failure to send out a convincing campaign message, the unpopular judgement debt payment saga against the National Democratic Congress (NDC) government has landed at ground zero, as the Kufuor administration has been fingered for having paid huge sums of money as judgement debt settlement. In a smart move, the NPP has ignored what transpired in the era in connection with the payment of judgment debts, and basterdizing the current administration on the move that would bring some breather to the country�s finances in the future. Between 2004 and 2008, the then Kufuor administration paid huge sums as judgement debts, but they have been swept under the carpet as if nothing took place. What is striking is the payment of monies by the NPP on January 9, 2009, the day that Ghanaians converged on the Independence Square in Accra to usher in the new NDC administration. Documents gleaned by The Enquirer newspaper on judgment debt payments indicate that on January 7, 2009, an amount of GH�3,000,000.00 was paid to one Mr. E.K. Owusu as compensation for loss of confiscated assets. On that same day, another GH�100,000 was paid to Nii Kojo Danso as judgment against the Executive Secretary of the Land Valuation Board. More disturbing is the fact that, in 2009, when the Mills administration had not sworn ministers into office, some monies were paid out as judgment debts. For instance, Alhaji Yusif Ibrahim was paid GH�6,133,0867.40 as full and final settlement of judgment debt due in a suit he and others filed against Accra metro Assembly and Samuel Addokwei Addo, on January 8, 2009. In spite of these documentations, the NPP had carefully crafted events to make things to look as if no judgemnt debt was paid under its tenure. Indeed, unfolding events have revealed, in some instances, the Kufuor administration ignored overtures from some companies for settlement of debts, a situation that could have saved the nation several millions of cedis. In the case of the Construction Pioneer (CP) debts, it is now clear that the Kufuor administration cooked up fraud against the company to avoid payment, even though the government at the time lost an arbitration of the matter. Amazingly, a warning fired by Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Mr. Joe Ghartey, bordering on the manner the refusal to pay CP�s debt was accruing interest of over 8,000 Euros daily, was ignored.