TSATSU TSIKATA JAILED 5 YEARS

Stephen K. Effah
Thursday, 19 June 2008

THE trial of Tsatsu Tsikata, former Chief Executive of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation, which dragged for five years and eight months, ended yesterday with the Accra Fast Track High Court sentencing him to five years in prison.

He was charged with wilfully causing financial loss to the state and misapplying public funds.

The court found him guilty of all four counts of causing financial loss of about ¢2.3 billion to the state through a loan he, acting on behalf of the GNPC, guaranteed for Valley Farms Limited, a private cocoa producing company in 1991, and misapplying public property.

The court, presided over by Justice Henrietta Abban, sentenced him to five years imprisonment on each count to run concurrently.

Before his sentence, Mr. Tsikata was seeking an order at the Supreme Court to bring the International Finance Corporation to testify in the case in which both the Court of Appeal and the Fast Track High Court had ruled that the IFC has immunity from the processes of the courts.

But Mr.Tsikata insisted that failure to get the corporation to testify "will occasion a miscarriage of justice".

The Supreme Court had fixed June 25, to deliberate on Mr.Tsikata’s application, but when Justice Abban sat yesterday, she made it clear that she was proceeding to read her judgement because the court had not received any order from the Supreme Court to stay proceedings.

After the prosecution, led by Attorney General Joe Ghartey announced themselves to the court yesterday, Mr Tsikata, who had gone to seek an adjournment to enable him to move a motion for an acquittal, told the court that his counsel, Prof. Emmanuel Victor Oware Dankwa,was out of the court’s jurisdiction.

He argued that he needed the services of his counsel before the case could proceed, but the judge asked him to represent himself since he is a lawyer, so that she could go on with the case.

Delivering the judgement, which took about two hours, Justice Abban said the prosecution was able to establish, beyond reasonable doubt, a case against Mr Tsikata.

On the charge of wilfully causing financial loss, the court said the prosecution was able to lead evidence to prove that Mr Tsikata authorised the guarantee of the loan without the GNPC board’s approval, which Valley Farms defaulted in repayment.

The court held that the venture embarked upon by Mr Tsikata caused financial loss to the GNPC, which is a state institution, and the loss was occasioned by acts wilfully done by Mr Tsikata, then Chief Executive of the corporation.

On misappropriation of public property, the court further held that the prosecution was able to prove that Mr Tsikata intentionally misapplied public property when he authorised the guarantee.

When the judge completed reading her judgement, she asked Mr Tsikata who stood throughout the proceedings taking notes, whether he had any comments before the sentence was passed.

Mr Tsikata replied: "I have already indicated to the court that my counsel has travelled abroad. This court had previously adjourned proceedings to await an aspect of the Supreme Court ruling which can have significance for my defence".

He added, "This judgement is against the weight of evidence," but the judge cut in, saying "you are not in control of this court. You are not going to tell me what to do."

This resulted in a heated exchange between the judge and Mr Tsikata, but Justice Abban proceeded in passing the sentence.

She said: "I sentence you to five years in jail", Mr Tsikata responded: " I hope the albatross hanging around your neck has been removed"

Justice Abban: "Did I say I have any albatross hanging around my neck?"
Mr Tsikata: "You did say so some time ago."

Justice Abban stated: "I do not remember. All I said was that there should be an end to litigation."

Mr Tsikata then told the court of his intention to appeal against the judgement, and said, "before that I am applying for bail pending the appeal."

The judge then asked the prosecution to respond to the request by Mr Tsikata, and Mr Ghartey designated Mrs Yvonne Obuobisah, a Principal State Attorney, to do so.

Mrs. Obuobisah opposed the application when she took the floor. "This application is strange in the law. He must follow due process. There is no notice of appeal pending and he cannot put something on nothing," she said.

Further, she said, "the application has to rely on something but he did not state any exceptional grounds on which a bail should be granted".

But Mr Tsikata reacted: "There is no indication that judgement will be given today. I have been summoned to court but without my counsel who notified the court of his absence, and these are clearly unusual circumstances."

He said once the court rescinded its decision to await the Supreme Court’s verdict, it put him in a disadvantage, "I am taking steps to have the appeal filed but I have to be free to be able to do so."

The judge then replied: "I do not even know the grounds on which you are appealing. I therefore uphold the prosecution’s argument that there is no pending application based on which I can make my decision."

By the time proceedings ended, people had began to fill the court room. Notable among them was Mr John Mahama, the National Democratic Congress presidential running mate in the December poll.

After the court had ended proceedings, former President Jerry John Rawlings came there briefly and left.

Not long afterwards, the flag-bearer of the National Democratic Congress , Prof John Atta Mills and the party’s General Secretary Asiedu Nketsia also came around

Tsikata was later taken to the court’s registry by police escorts to process and sign the necessary documents before being taken to prison.

The Times later learnt that Mr Tsikata filed a notice of appeal and stay of execution pending

appeal and was due to move his application later yesterday.

The prosecution’s case was that Mr Tsikata, then Chief Executive of the GNPC, guaranteed a loan contracted by Valley Farms from Caisse Centrale, now Agence Francaise De Development (AFD) in 1991, but the company defaulted, thus compelling GNPC to pay the loan in 1996.

Mr Tsikata is said to have guaranteed the loan without the GNPC board’s approval.
The case started in October 2002 with the late Mr. Osafo Sampong, the then Director of Public Prosecutions leading the prosecuteion.

In 2002, the Supreme Court ruled that the Fast Track Court trying Mr Tsikata was unconstitutional, following a challenge by Mr Tsikata of its status, a decision which was overturned later in a judicial review.

Mr. Joe Ghartey is the third Attorney-General after Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and Mr. J. Ayikoi Otoo, to prosecute the case.

In all, seven witnesses were called by the prosecution, while the defence called one. There were also two court witnesses from the Merchant Bank.