Saglemi project: High Court gives Alhaji Yakubu 48-hours to show up

Despite being slapped with charges in August 2021 with a former Minister of the Ministry, Alhaji Collins Dauda, his successor, Dr Kwaku Agyeman-Mensah and two others over the Saglemi Affordable Housing Project, the trial has been at a standstill due to the health condition of the former Chief Director.

The others are the Executive Chairman of Construtora OAS, the Brazilian company which constructed the affordable housing project at Saglemi, Andrew Clocanas, and a director of RMS, the Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) consultancy subcontractor, Nouvi Tetteh Angelo, over the Saglemi Affordable Housing Project.

The accused persons had pleaded not guilty to counts of willfully causing financial loss to the state, misapplying public property, issuing false certificates and dishonestly causing loss to public property when they made their first appearance at the Court presided over by Justice Elfreda Amy Dankyi.

The original charge sheet, bearing 52 counts against the accused persons was substituted by the state on January 24, 2023 and the case was subsequently re-assigned to Justice Owusu-Dapaa on May 31, 2023.

Per the old facts presented by the Attorney-General (A-G), Godfred Yeboah Dame, in August 2012, the then President, John Dramani Mahama, granted Executive approval to the Ministry of Housing for the construction of 5,000 affordable housing units, to be known as the Saglemi Affordable Housing Project.

The housing units, to be executed by Construtora OAS Ltd, were to be sold to workers through mortgage arrangements provided by the then Ghana Home Loans Company.

That led to a further reduction in the scope of works to 1,412 housing units at a revised price of $181 million and extended the completion period to July 31, 2017, the A-G alleged.