[BREAKING]: Former COCOBOD boss Opuni, Seidu Agogo walk free as AG discontinues case
The former CEO of the Ghana Cocoa Board (Cocobod), Dr. Stephen Kwabena Opuni, and the CEO of Agricult Ghana Limited, Seidu Agongo, are free men after the state dropped all criminal charges against them in a court case that lasted nearly eight years.
Dr. Opuni, together with Mr Agongo, were standing trial for 27 charges of causing financial loss and defrauding under false pretences.
At the hearing of the matter at the High Court on Tuesday, January 28, a state attorney, Enam Loh Mensah, informed the court, presided over by Justice Aboagye Tandoh, that the Attorney General wished to withdraw and have the case struck out.
“My lord respectfully, the Attorney General has instructed that the charges against the accused persons in this matter be withdrawn. Pursuance to this, the Republic has filed a notice of withdrawal.”
Meanwhile, the lawyer of the former Cocobod boss, Samuel Codjoe, and the legal representative of the second accused (Mr. Agongo), Benson Nutsukpui, have confirmed to the court that they have been served with the notice of withdrawal.
Background
The former Cocobod boss and the CEO of Agricult Ghana Limited, an agrochemicals company, were being tried over allegations of causing financial loss of more than GH₵271 million to the state.
The GH₵271 million alleged financial loss to the state was in respect of their engagement in illegalities in a series of fertiliser transactions, making the Attorney-General drag them to court in March 2018.
Agongo is alleged to have used fraudulent means to sell substandard fertiliser to Cocobod for onward distribution to cocoa farmers.
Dr Opuni was also accused of facilitating the act by allowing Agongo’s products not to be tested and certified as required by law.
The 27 charges against them included engaging in illegalities leading to the distribution of substandard fertilisers to cocoa farmers.
The two had always maintained their innocence and pleaded not guilty to all the charges against them.
Subsequently, they were granted a GH¢300,000 self-recognisance bail each.