The High Court has thrown out an application filed by lawyers for former Director-General of the National Signals Bureau, Kwabena Adu Boahen.
The legal team for Kwabena Adu Boahen were seeking to criminal trial pending the outcome of an appeal.
Kwabena Adu Boahen’s legal team had urged the court to stay proceedings until the Court of Appeal determines their challenge to an earlier ruling.
The court’s earlier ruling partially dismissed a request for further disclosures made on behalf of the first and second accused persons in the ongoing trial.
Also, on Wednesday, October 15, a notice filed at the High Court in Accra revealed Ms Donkor was formally discharged under Section 59 of the Criminal and Other Offences (Procedure) Act, 1960 (Act 30).
Mildred Donkor is now expected to give insight into the alleged theft and misappropriation of state funds by the former National Signals Bureau boss, Kwabena Adu-Boahene, and his wife, Angela Adjei-Boateng and their company, Advantage Solutions Limited.
Earlier, Ms Donkor abruptly dismissed her lawyer in open court on July 18, saying, “I wish to take a separate lawyer, please,” she told the judge at the time.
In the six-page document signed by the Deputy Attorney General, Dr Justice Srem Sai, it detailed how Mildred Donkor became involved in Adu-Boahene’s scandal.
Mildred Donkor, in her witness statement, labelled her association with the first and second accused persons as longstanding from their days at Cedar Mountain Assemblies of God Church in East Legon.In her witness statement, Donkor alleged that it all started when Adu-Boahene requested that she become a director of Advantage Solutions Limited when he couldn’t meet the registration requirements when he wanted to open a bank account for his business.
Parts of the document read, “This was sometimes in the year 2010. At the time of opening the account for (A4), A4 could not meet the minimum requirement for two directors. A4 had only one director, as the other director on A4’s record was deceased. To satisfy the minimum directorship requirement for A4, A1 requested that I become the second director, which I consented to. I put my name down as the second director. That is how I became a director of A4”.
She detailed on page two of the document how she ended up working for Adu-Boahene after she resigned from UMB in July 2018.
“I never received a letter of employment or appointment at A4. Therefore, I was not given specific duties nor formal terms of employment. I only acted on ad hoc instructions from A1 and A2. However, I was paid a monthly stipend. For instance, I was paid Three Thousand One Hundred and Thirty-Seven Ghana cedis (GH¢3,137) up to January 2021,” she added.
She further told the prosecutors that she managed several transactions on behalf of the accused persons, including withdrawal and delivery of a large cash sum from bank accounts belonging to Advantage Solutions Limited and another firm, adding that the first and second accused provided her with pre-signed blank cheque books, allowing her to withdraw from GH¢2,000 to GH¢1 million.
Mildred Donkor detailed, “A1 and A2, from time to time, instructed me to carry out tasks on their behalf in respect of A4. For example, they had, on one occasion, instructed me to facilitate the payment of cheques signed by A1 and A2 to third parties… When I withdrew such cheques, I delivered the monies either A1 or A2. Sometimes, too, I transfer the monies to Madam Margaret Aba Donkor at her request”.
“Throughout my work with A1 and A2, I took no major decisions – whether financial, operations, or strategic – on my own. I followed the decisions and instructions of A1 or A2. Throughout my works with A4, I was never invited to, neither did I ever attend, a board of directors’ meeting. I was never a signatory to any bank account”, she added.
The AG is now expected to rely on her testimony to strengthen its case against the remaining accused persons.