Aubrey Mends
FORMER SPOKESPERSON for the Ashanti Regional Minister, Aubrey Mends is alleged to have defrauded a contractor of ¢450 million and vanished into thin air.
The suspect reportedly collected the money from the contractor who was seriously chasing a contract at the Regional Coordinating Council (RCC) in Kumasi.
Mr. Mends told the said contractor that he should pay him ¢450 million, which represented 10 percent of the contract that he was after, before he would eventually be awarded the contract.
Realizing how close Mr. Mends was to his then boss, Dr. Kwaku Agyeman Mensah, the contractor became convinced that if he paid the money, the spokesman might influence the minister to award him the contract.
But months after the said contractor had paid the huge sum to Mr. Mends and his cohorts, the contract promised him by Mr. Mends was not forthcoming. He then suspected foul and reported the matter to the police.
Since the story broke a few weeks ago, Aubrey Mends had gone into hiding just to escape police arrest, DAILY GUIDE was reliably informed.
The paper however gathered that one Mensah Aborampah, a cohort of Mr. Mends in the deal, had since been arrested by the police in Kumasi and granted police enquiry bail.
Meanwhile, the Ashanti Regional Minister, Dr. Agyeman Mensah, whose name was associated with the devious story, has come out boldly to deny his involvement in the matter.
Addressing newsmen at a press soiree at his residence last Wednesday, he said information reaching him indicated that Mr. Mends had been involved in an alleged fraud case.
The minister, who would not go into details about what exactly Mr. Mends had done, said he immediately ordered the spokesman to step aside whilst the police investigated the matter.
Dr. Mensah noted that he had no hand in the said illegal deal, stressing that he did not send any one to collect money from any contractor on his behalf, urging the public to disassociate his name from the case.
In a related development, DAILY GUIDE has gathered that Mr. Mends is no longer the Spokesperson of the Ashanti Regional Minister.
A top official of the NDC in the Ashanti Region, Francis Dodovi, was appointed to replace him.
Dodovi, who is a trained journalist with immense experience, had started official duties and had been heard on various platforms, speaking on behalf of the minister.
FROM I.F. Joe Awuah Jnr., Kumasi