By Albert Futukpor
Tamale, Oct 23, GNA – The High Court, Tamale has convicted four persons including three former executives of the Northern Development Authority (NDA) of seven counts of corruption and corruption-related offences involving procurement contracts under the government’s Infrastructure for Poverty Eradication Programme.
The convicts are Sumaila Abdul-Rahman, former Chief Executive of the NDA, Stephen Yir-Eru Engmen, former Deputy Chief Executive in-charge of Operations, Patrick Seidu, former Deputy Chief Executive in-charge of Finance and Administration, and Andrew Kuundaari, Chief Executive of A&QS Consortium Limited, a private company.
The court, however, declined to impose custodial sentences on the convicts citing their advanced ages and the swift intervention by the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP), which prevented unlawful payments under the contracts resulting in no financial loss to the state.
The court, however, imposed a fine of 1,000 penalty units on each of the convict for each of the seven counts.
The offences for which the four were convicted included conspiracy to directly or indirectly influence the procurement process to obtain an unfair advantage in the award of a procurement contract, directly or indirectly influencing the procurement process to obtain an unfair advantage, corruption by a public officer, and corruption of a public officer.
The case was prosecuted by the OSP following investigations into a complaint lodged by Mr Martin Kpebu, a legal practitioner.
GNA
Edited by Eric K. Amoh/Kenneth Odeng Adade
Reporter: Albert Futukpor
Email: [email protected]