{"id":650032,"date":"2019-07-04T12:45:00","date_gmt":"2019-07-04T12:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"<br><div>\n\t\t\n<p><strong>Dr. Stephen Opuni<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>An Accra High Court hearing the case of former Chief Executive\nOfficer of a Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), Stephen Opuni, charged with causing\nfinancial loss to the state has been told that the cu"},"modified":"2019-07-04T12:45:00","modified_gmt":"2019-07-04T12:45:00","slug":"twist-in-opunis-trial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2019\/07\/04\/twist-in-opunis-trial\/","title":{"rendered":"Twist In Opuni\u2019s Trial &#8211;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p><strong>Dr. Stephen Opuni<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>An Accra High Court hearing the case of former Chief Executive<br \/>\nOfficer of a Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), Stephen Opuni, charged with causing<br \/>\nfinancial loss to the state has been told that the current COCOBOD administration<br \/>\ndid not err in purchasing fertilizer through single source procurement.<\/p>\n<p>According to a former Deputy Chief Executive in charge of Agronomy<br \/>\nand Quality Control at COCOBOD, Dr. Adu-Ampoma, unlike Lithovit fertilizer<br \/>\nwhich did not go through the full cycle of testing, the trials that led to the<br \/>\npurchase of Cocoa Nti fertilizer went through all the testing protocols at the<br \/>\nCocoa Research Institute of Ghana (CRIG) before approval was given for the<br \/>\ntransaction. <\/p>\n<p>He said during cross examination in the trial of Dr. Opuni and<br \/>\nbusinessman Seidu Agongo who are charged with causing financial loss of over<br \/>\nGH\u00a2271 million to the state that the trials for Cocoa Nti Fertilizer were<br \/>\nconducted on farms in two consecutive seasons \u2013 2016\/17 and 2017\/18 and at nine<br \/>\ndifferent locations. <\/p>\n<p>Lawyers for Dr. Opuni suggested to the witness that COCOBOD also<br \/>\npurchased fertilizer (Cocoa Nti) through single source similar to what Dr.<br \/>\nOpuni is being accused of during his tenure but the witness said Cocoa Nti went<br \/>\nthrough all testing protocols at CRIG while Lithovit supplied by Mr. Agongo\u2019s<br \/>\ncompany during Dr Opuni\u2019s tenure did not.<\/p>\n<p>The lawyer asked the witness if COCOBOD in its letter to PPA seeking<br \/>\napproval had stated that farmers preferred Cocoa Nti fertilizer and he answered<br \/>\nin the affirmative. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Lawyer:<\/strong> On the 5th of March 2018 COCOBOD by a letter<br \/>\napplied for single source to purchase Cocoa Nti fertilizer and added that<br \/>\nfarmers preferred Cocoa Nti. Isn\u2019t it? <\/p>\n<p><strong>Witness:<\/strong> Yes, my lord. But as I said if you look<br \/>\nat the report you will see that the field test had been conducted on farmers\u2019<br \/>\nfarms in the Central, Western, Eastern, Ashanti and Brong Ahafo regions.\u00a0 And as I\u2019ve previously said during trial,<br \/>\nneighbouring farmers had seen the impact of this fertilizer <\/p>\n<p><strong>Lawyer:<\/strong> When were these tests done on Cocoa Nti<br \/>\nfrom the scientific report?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Witness:<\/strong> It says the trials were conducted on<br \/>\nfarmers\u2019 farms in two consecutive seasons (2016\/17 and 2017\/18 at nine<br \/>\nlocations). <\/p>\n<p><strong>More Documents<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In the course of the trial, the prosecution provided Dr. Opuni with<br \/>\na number of documents he insisted were crucial to his defence. <\/p>\n<p>The documents include letter written by<br \/>\nCOCOBOD seeking approval for the Public Procurement Authority (PPA) to sole<br \/>\nsource fertilizers for use by farmers. <\/p>\n<p>Others include approval letter by PPA granting COCOBOD permission to<br \/>\ngo ahead to purchase the fertilizers through single source. <\/p>\n<p>The court had to adjourn its previous sitting due to the insistence<br \/>\nof Dr. Opuni\u2019s lawyer that he could not continue his cross examination of the<br \/>\nstate\u2019s third witness if he is not provided with the documents. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Cross Examination<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The lawyer finally resumed his cross examination of the witness Dr.<br \/>\nYaw Adu-Ampoma, insisting that contrary to the evidence-in-chief that adverts<br \/>\nare placed in terms of purchase of fertilizers this has never happened in the<br \/>\nhistory of COCOBOD in respect of purchase of agrochemicals. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cNo my lord; in some instances adverts are placed in the papers. In<br \/>\nsome other times due to the peculiar nature of some chemicals they are not but<br \/>\nin general terms you are supposed to do. But sometimes if it is explained to<br \/>\nPPA it could be allowed without placing adverts in the papers,\u201d the witness<br \/>\nresponded. <\/p>\n<p>Hearing continues on July 10.<\/p>\n<p><strong>BY Gibril Abdul Razak<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dr. Stephen Opuni An Accra High Court hearing the case of former Chief Executive Officer of a Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), Stephen Opuni, charged with causing financial loss to the state has been told that the current COCOBOD administration did not err in purchasing fertilizer through single source procurement. According to a former Deputy Chief [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":650033,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-650032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-politics"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Twist In Opuni\u2019s Trial - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2019\/07\/04\/twist-in-opunis-trial\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Twist In Opuni\u2019s Trial - Ghanamma.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Dr. Stephen Opuni An Accra High Court hearing the case of former Chief Executive Officer of a Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), Stephen Opuni, charged with causing financial loss to the state has been told that the current COCOBOD administration did not err in purchasing fertilizer through single source procurement. 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