Two additional suspects have been detained In connection with ongoing inquiries into money stolen from Cecilia Dapaah, the former minister of sanitation’s house,
The police prosecutor, DSP Emmanuel Nyamekye, revealed this in court on Wednesday, August 2, when the case was called.
A total of five people, including two of the former aviation minister’s housekeepers, were first detained on suspicion of stealing $ 1,000,000, $ 300,000, and $ Thousands of Ghana Cedis worth of personal goods.
However, the accused were not present in court because, as the prosecutor stated, Tamale was the location of the investigators’ next round of inquiry.
With the arrest of the two, there are now seven accused people. One of them, Sarah Agyei, the second accused, was given bail last week, but she hasn’t complied with the bail requirements.
The remaining six people, including the two recently arrested, have been detained in police custody.
August 8 is the new date for the case.
However, the lawyer for the second accused, Augustine Gyamfi, said that the Police were impeding their attempts to adhere to the bail requirements.
BACKGROUND
On Friday, July 21, it was revealed that two of the Minister’s housekeepers were being prosecuted by the Accra Circuit Court for allegedly taking money in the amount of $1 million, $300,000, and millions of Ghanaian cedis in October 2022 from the former minister’s home in Abelenkpe, Accra.
Between July and October 2022, the two, Sarah Agyei, 30, and Patience Botwe, 18, are accused of stealing the couple’s money and personal belongings.
Both have been accused of stealing US$1 million, €300,000, and millions of Ghanaian cedis, as well as conspiring to conduct a crime on one count.
The 68-year-old former Minister denies the numbers in the court filing, but the information shocked a lot of Ghanaians.
Ghana’s cedi currency has been losing value rapidly in recent months, with those in charge of the troubled economy blaming dollar hoarders for the woes of the cedi.
It was shocking for many to learn that a government minister may have been holding foreign currency herself.
Resignation and Arrest
Ms Dapaah resigned as minister of sanitation and water resources a post she had held for the last five years on Saturday in order, she said, not to distract from the work of the government. She added that she was sure that any investigation would show she had acted with integrity.
That did not quell the anger. By Monday, July 24, she was under arrest.
The Office of the Special Prosecutor, which deals with graft allegations against high-level officials, announced that it had arrested and was questioning Ms Dappah for “suspected corruption and corruption-related offenses regarding large amounts of money and other valuable items reportedly stolen from her residence”.
She was released on bail late on Monday evening after her official and private residences in the capital, Accra, were searched.
The saga began with a burglary – or possibly a series of burglaries – at the minister’s private home, which she shares with her husband and daughter.
Two women, who worked as domestic workers for the family, are at the centre of the accusations. One is alleged to have operated as a lookout, while the other allegedly stole the cash and other goods. They – as well as the three others accused – have not commented on the charges.
The “brief facts” of the investigation, which are attached to the charge sheet, say that last October Ms Dapaah’s husband, Daniel Osei Kuffour, returned home and heard “an unusual noise” from his bedroom and then found one of the accused hiding behind the door.
It was afterwards that the couple realised that things were missing but they only went to the police seven months later.
It is not clear why there was such a long delay, but in that time the accused are alleged to have gone on an extravagant spending spree.
One allegedly bought a three-bedroom house on the outskirts of Accra as well as items to go in it: a double-decker fridge, a television, a washing machine, a chest freezer, a gas cooker and a water dispenser. She allegedly gave money to her boyfriend to buy two cars – a Hyundai Elantra and a Honda Civic.
The couple are also accused of renting another three-bedroom house in a different city and a store room.
The other former employee of Ms Dapaah is alleged to have spent some of her share of the stolen money on building her own three-bedroom house.
But for the former minister herself, the source of the money that funded this alleged huge shopping bill was a mystery.
In her resignation letter, Ms Dapaah said the reports that she had “various huge sums of foreign currencies and millions of Ghana cedis… do not represent correctly what my husband and I reported to the police”.
President Nana Akufo-Addo’s response disappointed anti-corruption campaigners as it appeared to prejudge the outcome of the investigations.
He wrote to Ms. Dapaah, “I am confident… that at the end of the day, your integrity, while in office, will be established.”
Since President Akufo-Addo was first elected in 2017, she has worked as a minister, first in the field of aviation and then, a year later, in the field of water and sanitation.
Being one of just three women in the president’s cabinet, Ms. Dapaah was highly known.
Now, as the special prosecutor looks into whether she truly did have such enormous sums of money in her home and if so, where it came from, her political future is in jeopardy.
