Professor Says Cecilia Dapaah’s Case Damaging to Akufo-Addo’s Government

Professor Baffour Agyeman-Duah, a former UN senior governance advisor, has said the theft case involving huge sums of money in the home of the former sanitation minister is damaging to the Akufo-Addo-led administration.

Cecilia Dapaah resigned over the weekend following reportage that millions of cedis has been stolen by two of her house helps at her Abelemkpe residence.

The two principal accused, 18-year-old Patience Botwe and 30-year-old Sarah Agyei, are charged with conspiracy to commit a crime and five counts of stealing. The alleged thefts occurred between July and October 2022.

During this period, the house helps allegedly stole personal effects belonging to Dapaah, including assorted clothes valued at GHC95,000 and handbags, perfumes and jewellery worth $95,000.

Additionally, Botwe is accused of stealing six sets of kente cloth worth GHC90,000 and six sets of men’s suits valued at $3,000, which belong to the minister’s husband.

Furthermore, three other individuals, identified as Botwe’s current and former boyfriends and her father, are also facing charges for allegedly being involved in the crime. They are respectively charged with dishonestly receiving GHC1 million, GHC180,000 and GHC50,000.

“This incident is very damaging for the president and his government when you place in the larger context of the popular public disenchantment with the way the economy is being managed,” Agyeman-Duah told the Asaase Breakfast Show on Monday (24 July).

“And this adds salt to an already bad situation. I think that is why when I read the president’s acceptance letter, I was a little bit taken aback, because this was a fine opportunity for the president to dramatise his own concern and disgust about behaviour such as this,” Agyeman-Duah told show host Kwaku Nhyira-Addo.

“We are not concluding that Cecilia Dapaah has done wrong at this time until it is investigated. But as a president who is constantly bombarded about his inertia in addressing such issues, this would have been a wonderful opportunity to distance himself and not to conclude in his acceptance letter that she will be exonerated, he shouldn’t have made that statement,” he added.