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The Head of the Banking Department of the Bank of Ghana (BoG), Mrs Elly Ohene-Adu, on Wednesday told the Judgement Debt Commission that the central bank had paid the judgement debt compensation due Astek Food Processing Company Limited (AFPC) in full. She, therefore, said the petition of the managers of AFPC to the commission to impress on the central bank to pay an outstanding interest on the judgement debt did not have any basis. Mrs Ohene-Adu said the BoG paid $1,702,736, plus $241,164 interest and 350 million cedi costs to AFPC in 1999. She said the payment was based on the judgement of the court in 2008 and a compromise reached between the BoG and AFPC. Background Recounting the background to the case, Mrs Ohene-Adu said in the 1990s, Ghana entered into a trade partnership with Libya. Under that agreement, Ghana was to export horticultural products to Libya in exchange for crude oil of the same value to be shipped to Ghana by Libya. She said the BoG was to pay the exporters of the horticultural products in cedis. Mrs Ohene-Adu said in 1995, there was some disputes in that partnership and so the government decided to suspend the shipment of the horticultural products to Libya. Consequently, she said the central bank informed the horticultural association of the government�s decision to suspend the exercise but AFPC made two shipments to Libya at the same time. She said the BoG decided that it would not pay AFPC for the shipment because the issue was well communicated to all the exporters. Mrs Ohene-Adu said AFPC took the case to court and got judgement against the central bank in 2008, and the bank was asked to pay the principal in cedis plus interest from 1996. She said the BoG reached a compromise with AFPC for the payment of the compensation in dollars plus interest of five per cent. Consequently, she said the central bank paid the amount in full to AFPC in 2009. Mrs Ohene-Adu said it was only in 2009 that managers of AFPC wrote to the BoG that it wanted additional interest on the compensation. AFPC managers When he took his turn earlier at the commission, the Executive Manager of AFPC, Dr Albert Ababio Owusu, told the commission that the company was paid the principal of $1,702,736, and part of the interest. Therefore, he said the BoG would have to pay the outstanding interest of 3.39 billion old cedis(GH� 399,000)to AFPC. Dr Owusu said he had written to the central bank for the settlement of the outstanding interest but he did not receive any favourable response. That, he said, informed his decision to petition the commission to get the issue resolved.