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An Accra-based businessman, Alfred Agbesi Woyome, has told the Fast Track High Court trying for him for allegedly causing financial loss to the state that a former Attorney General, Madam Betty Mould Iddrisu, consented to the payment of GH�51 million, which was awarded him for financial engineering that he did for the CAN 2008 stadium project. The accused read in open court a letter from Madam Iddrisu, indicating the wrongful determination of the contract, and that he (Woyome) must be duly compensated for his services. Woyome said the letter, which was from the Central Tender Review Board and signed by Madam Iddrisu, further indicated the concurrent approval of Vamed transferring his right to Waterville Company, adding that �this letter formed the basis of the bidding agreement between Vamed Company and the government of Ghana.� According to the accused, a meeting was initially held, where the Attorney General (AG) requested to know details on what the contract was about. As a result, Waterville Company wrote a letter to the AG confirming that the financial engineering was separate from the two contracts they signed with the government, and as well separate from the technical submission in the bid. He said there was another letter by Waterville to the AG to confirm that he (Woyome) was responsible for the financial arrangement that won Waterville Company the bid, as advertised. Woyome further told the court that after an exchange of letters, they arrived at a settlement, which emphasised that he must be paid 2% of the total funding, which included 60 plants with the Atomic Energy Commission, 10 stadia, six regional hospitals, and one national accident and emergency hospital. He said Shanghai Company came into the picture, because, along the way, then Minister of Youth and Sports Mr. Osafo Maafo and Chairman of the Local Organising Committee (LOC), Dr. Kofi Amoah, were summoned by then President John Kufuor to brief him about the bidding process, but this led to interference in the whole process. The interference, he noted, was that Shanghai Group of Companies in China, which did not take part in the bid, must be included. Then President Kufuor, therefore, called on the Ghana High Embassy to do due diligence on the Shanghai company, which they did, and later brought him the findings. Mr. Osafo Maafo and Dr. Kofi Amoah thereafter, were sent to China to negotiate with the Shanghai Company, where they signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the construction of the stadia at Essipon in the Western Region, and Tamale in the Northern Region. According to him, when they went to China, they signed US$38 million for each stadia and not US$25 million as the Kufuor government later told the press. Woyome further noted that after giving the contract to the Shanghai company, Mr. Yaw Osafo Maafo did not want to have any dealings with the project. Later, a lawyer by name Colleen Russell came down from London to settle the issue, but he did not succeed. Based on this failure, Russell wrote a letter to the government, indicating the need to maintain the contract in the bid.