GPHA Bamboozles Staff

Mr. Charles Osei Owusu, a resident of Ashaiman-Lebanon in Tema, is up in arms against the management of the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority (GPHA).

Mr. Owusu, a former messenger at the Finance Department of the Tema Port, is fighting the Port’s authorities to be reinstated after he was cleared by the Tema Regional CID of the Ghana Police of any fraudulent act in 2008, which involved the embezzlement of over GH¢47,000.

The amount in question was detected later to have been embezzled by one Mr. JK Atta-Quansah, the then Financial Manager at the Tema Port.

Mr. Quansah was reported to have fraudulently processed documents and caused GPHA-Tema to pay various sums of monies worth over GH¢47,000 into the accounts of two companies which included Global Joint Company and Deboat Refrigeration.

Narrating his ordeal to the paper, Mr. Osei Owusu recounted that on Saturday, 26th April, 2008 after management had detected the fraud through its internal auditors, he (Mr. Osei Owusu) was picked up by one Prosper from the Marine Block of the Tema Port to the Security Department.

“To my surprise, I was handcuffed and sent to the Tema main Harbour Police Station as a suspect by one Inspector Abu. Inspector Abu claimed that investigations revealed that I was the recipient of those fraudulent cheques which were issued to Global Joint and Deboat Refrigerators and Air-conditioners.

…I then wrote my statement that I was only instructed by my boss, Mr. Atta-Quansah, as a messenger to receive those cheques from the cashier to be handed over to him again on the same day which I complied. My brother, as to what happened to those cheques when I gave them back to my boss, I had no idea,” Mr. Osei Owusu said.

“I was then thrown into cells since I had no evidence to prove my innocence. On Monday, 28th April, 2008 Mr. Atta-Quansah and the Cashier, Mr. Samuel Affotey, were invited to the police station for interrogation based on my statement. They appeared at the station together with Madam Margaret Campbell, the Head of Legal Issues, GPHA, but they never told the police the truth. Mr. Atta-Quansah instead told the police that I might have stolen those cheques from his office since I was the only messenger close to him.

The case was then handed over to the Tema Regional Head of the police CID and I was taken back to cells.
A day after, Mr. Henry Kyei, the CEO of Global Joint Refrigeration, was contacted and invited to the police station. I was again picked up to meet him together with Mr. Atta-Quansah, Mr. Affotey and Mr. Zumah, a representative from the Audit Department of the Tema Port to witness the meeting.

…My brother, pure drama unfolded at the meeting and I will forever thank God for that day. Mr. Kyei, during the meeting, admitted that he rather received the fraudulent cheques from Mr. Atta-Quansah and not me [Osei Owusu].

After these startling revelations, the Tema Regional Police CID apologised unreservedly to me and cleared me of any act of fraud. The police immediately asked me to go back to work. But to my surprise, I was ordered by management to go home till further notice even after I had been cleared of any wrongdoing,” poor Mr. Osei Owusu recounted.

Mr. Osei Owusu further disclosed that about a month later the cashier was interdicted while he (Osei Owusu) was asked to go home together with 3 other casual messengers taking effect from 1st August, 2008.
“Three months later, the cashier and the 3 casual messengers were reinstated and are currently working. GPHA and authorities at the Tema Port have given deaf ears to several petitions I have written urging them to recall me back to work — and they have also refused to even compensate me,” he lamented.

Attempts to reach Esther Gyebi Donkor, the Public Relations Officer of the GPHA to comment on the issue proved abortive as she refused to answer calls from the paper.

She further refused to reply a text message the paper sent to her asking her to respond to the allegations levelled against her outfit.