General News of Friday, 15 July 2005
Source: Palaver
Palaver -- The ?Crusading Guide? has started doing exactly the same thing with the ?Hotel Kufuor? Affair by publishing documents we strongly suspect it does not understand or that is surely going to make the case worse for the Kufuor family. And as we did with the CNTCI loan documents, so shall we do with the ?Hotel Kufuor? documents. As the ?Crusading Guide? publishes them, we shall analyse them.
In its edition of last Tuesday, the ?Crusading Guide? published photocopies of three cheques purporting to be the cheques used in paying for ?Hotel Kufuor?. It also published two receipts acknowledging the payments and a letter from (Chief) John Addo Kufuor as Director of Airport West Hospitality Ltd forwarding the last of the Prudential Bank?s cheques for $1.5 million to Mr. Anthony Saoud of Accra as full and final settlement for the purchase of the Hotel.
Now let us tell the ?Crusading Guide? the problem those documents are going to cause the Kufuor family and further undermine the credibility of some of the people who have spoken on the matter.
In his interview with ?Radio Gold? last Tuesday, Hon. David Henric Yeboah, NPP MP for Afigya Sekyere East and son-in-law of Mr. Anthony Saoud, who held the power of attorney for Mr. Saoud to dispose of the Hotel, stated that he did not know how the ?Crusading Guide? got the cheques in question to photocopy and publish them.
The ?Crusading Guide?s publication exposes that denial as a lie and seriously dents the credibility of Hon. Yeboah as a truthful witness. The cheques were given to the ?Crusading Guide? either by Hon. Yeboah himself, since he claimed to have collected them, or by somebody in their camp.
Why do we say this? Because none of the three published cheques bears the stamp of any bank; neither the receiving bank nor the paying bank. What it means is that whoever collected the cheques made photocopies of the cheques before paying them into any bank. It was those photocopies that were given to the ?Crusading Guide?, which the paper duly published. That is the only explanation for why the cheques do not bear the stamps of any bank.
Next, the Bank of Ghana cheque, which is a payment order drawn on the Prudential Bank and made payable to Mr. Anthony Saoud, bears the date 30-08-04. (Chief) John Addo Kufuor?s letter forwarding the cheque is dated August 26, 2004, and it quotes the cheque number of the Bank of Ghana cheque dated 30-08-04 as 391676.
We all know that payment orders from the Central Bank are not post-dated, so when (Chief) John Addo Kufuor was writing his letter to Anthony Saoud on 26th August 2004, how did he know that the Bank of Ghana cheque to be issued on 30-08-04 was going to bear the number 391676?