Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta will later today [Wednesday], appear before Parliament to disclose the full details of the controversial $2.25 billion bond issued by the government in April 2017.
This follows the passage of a half-hour motion last week by the House, to summon the minister to provide the full complement of documentation related to the issuance, the participants, the utilization of proceeds and the currency in which the bond was settled.
[contextly_sidebar id=”v74jq0V39tpEFQVrSmHTOBZFsPk3Joya”]The motion was filed by the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu.
Mr. Iddrisu argued that, because the House approved the Appropriation Bill, any government expenditure in relation to it must come to Parliament.
Concerns have been raised about the transparency of the $2.25 billion domestic bond government issued, with some noting that the alleged secrecy over the deal fueled the allegations of conflict of interest against the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta.
The Minority first cried foul saying a non-executive director on the Board of Investment Firm, Franklin Templeton, which purchased 95 percent of the bond, is also the Chairman of the Enterprise Group, which has links to the Attorney-General and the Finance Minister.
‘Nothing but full disclosure’
Ahead of the sitting, Minority Spokesperson on Finance, Cassiel Ato Forson, noted to Citi News that the minority would accept nothing but full disclosure on the bond issue from the Minister.
“The minister responsible for finance should appear before this House and present to this Honourable House the full complement of all the documentation relating to the issuance of this bond. That is what we asked for.”
Anything other than the full compliment, according to, Mr. Forson, “would be contempt of Parliament because Parliament was specific. The resolution was straight forward. No ambiguity involved. We said present full complements of the documentation.”
Aside from this, the Minority in Parliament has also filed a complaint with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of the United States of America over the bond issue, in the hope that it would lead to investigations by the US regulatory body into the bond issuance, and the involvement of Franklin Templeton, which is a US registered company.
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By: Duke Mensah Opoku/Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana