Organisers of the 2017 Ghana Expatriate Business Awards, Millennium Excellence Foundation, received GHS2.367,426.06 from the Ministry of Trade and Industry as proceeds from its recently held awards ceremony for expatriates, the Foundation’s president Ashim Morton has told the five-member ad hoc parliamentary committee probing the matter.
Mr Morton said the foundation invested GHS40,000 on the awards ceremony.
“The Foundation has received in total GHS2.367,426.06 from the Ministry of Trade and Industry and the GHS40,000 received from the Ministry of Trade was paid back,” President of the Foundation, Ashim Morton told the committee on Monday, 15 January 2018.
The Millennium Excellence Foundation has been accused of colluding with the Ministry of Trade and Industry to extort cash from expatriate businessmen to sit close to President at the award ceremony.
The Speaker of parliament set up the committee to investigate the matter after the Minority in Parliament raised an alarm that access to the president was being sold to the highest bidder.
Meanwhile, Mr Gbeho, on Monday, also told the committee that the Foundation has been depending on sponsorship for its events for the past 30 years in countries such as Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, among others, and plainly denied selling access to the president.
“We sought and received the partnership of the Ministry of Trade and Industry on clearly spelt out areas of responsibility and the rest is history. The Millennium Excellence Foundation did not and Mr Chairman we should repeat that, we did not coerce or levy any person or institution to come out with sums of money that will enable them to sit next to the Head of State,” Mr Gbeho said.
He continued: “The Foundation found voluntary sponsors to support the first-class event that was held. It did not sell seats for cash nor was any expatriate excluded from the attendance of the event because it did not sponsor. Indeed, it is a fact that most of the VIPs seated on the presidential table did not pay sponsorship or the alleged $100,000 before the gala event. Finally, Mr Chairman, I wish, on behalf of the Millennium Excellence Foundation, to confirm that the Foundation did not participate nor encourage any stratagem to steal money from any businessman.”
Source: Ghana/ClassFMonline.com