It has emerged that Ghana paid more than US$2.8 million to Sheikh Ahmed Dalmook Al Maktoum for the procurement of the Sputnik V vaccine.
The Communications Director of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Sammy Gyamfi, is urging Ghanaians not to over-concentrate on the Health Minister in the discussion about the botched Sputnik vaccine supply deal.
He said the government official indicted in the deal in “the Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta, who without Parliamentary approval, paid a whopping 160 billion old Ghana cedis to the Dubai Sheikh.”
He believes the Finance Minister is the chief culprit in the botched deal.
He alleged that Ken Ofori-Atta “is the same person who without any transparent selection process, engaged and paid his own company, Enterprise Insurance a whopping 110 billion old Ghana cedis as a COVID-19 insurance premium for health workers.”
In a statement copied to Kojo Emmanuel of Pulse.com,gh, Sammy Gyamfi said “Why is no one calling for the head of this corrupt Finance Minister? Is it because he is the cousin of the President?”
He, therefore, called on the Minister to resign.
“The reckless conduct of Ken Ofori-Atta in paying millions of Ghana cedis for an unlawful Vaccine Supply contract makes it imperative that Parliament immediately conducts a bi-partisan probe into the entire government expenditure on COVID-19 and related matters. But even before that, #KenOforiAttaMustResign,” he stated.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Health has stated that Sheikh Ahmed Dalmook Al Maktoum has agreed to refund $2,470,000 paid by government to supply 300,000 doses of Sputnik COVID-19 vaccines.
A letter from the Ministry said “The Private Officer of His Highness, per the correspondence, has honourably agreed to refund an amount of $2,470,000 being the balance left on the 50% advance payment of $2,850,000.”
