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| Court Adjourns Tsatsu''s Judgement |
5/31/2007 |
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An Accra Fast Track High Court (FTC) on Wednesday fixed Monday, June 4, for judgement in the case in which Tsatsu Tsikata, former Chief Executive of Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), is charged with wilfully causing financial loss of 2.3 billion cedis to the state. The case was adjourned because an appeal filed by Tsikata against Court of Appeal has yet to be heard at the Supreme Court. The date was fixed at the Judge''s Chambers, hence there was no formal sitting.
Judgement would not be given at the FTC until the determination of his appeal at the Supreme Court (SC) against the Appeal Court''s decision that the lower court could not order that the International Finance Corporation (IFC) should be served to appear before it. The accused is charged on four counts of causing financial loss and intentionally misapplying funds totalling 2.345 billion cedis, property of the state.
The offence, according to State Attorney, is contrary to Section 1(2) of the Public Property Protection Decree 1977 (SMCD140). Tsatsu has pleaded not guilty to the charges and the trial judge, Mrs Justice Henrietta Abban, an Appeal Court Judge sitting on the case as a High Court Judge, has granted him a 700 million-cedi self-recognisance bail. Prof. Emmanuel Victor O. Dankwa and Major Rowland S. Agbenato (Rtd) appearing for Tsatsu have gone to the Supreme Court to appeal against the Court of Appeal, which by a unanimous decision dismissed an application filed by the accused to pray the Supreme Court to make the IFC part to his appeal.
The Court of Appeal in dismissing Tsatsu''s appeal stated that the motion to join the IFC to the appeal challenging the lower court''s decision not to call the IFC to testify was not grounded on any rule. It further stated that the rule under which the application was brought was deleted in 1998.
The prosecution led by Mrs. Gertrude Aikins, Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), had told the court that Tsatsu had caused financial loss to the state through a loan he, on behalf of the GNPC, guaranteed for Valley Farms.
Valley Farms contracted the loan from Caisse Francaise de Developpement in 1991, but defaulted in the payment, compelling GNPC, which acted as the guarantor, to pay it in 1996.
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