Sir Sam Jonah, a Ghanaian business magnate and Chancellor of the University of Cape Coast, has said that high-rise buildings in prime areas are being funded through dishonest sources.
According to Sam Jonah, vacant high-rise apartments in Accra’s affluent neighbourhoods—such as Airport Residential, Cantonments, and Labone are being funded with possible illicit financing.
He expressed serious concerns about the country’s booming luxury real estate market.
Sam Jonah highlighted that if high-rise buildings were funded through bank-backed loans, developers would be forced to rent or sell units quickly to service debts.
Speaking in an interview on Starr Chat with Bola Ray, Sir Sam Jonah explained, “If you walk around my area, Airport Residential, Cantonments or Labone, [look at] all the high-rise buildings going up. Everywhere in the world, developers go to the bank to take loans for those developments”.
“Some of these apartments are all empty. Do you think that if money were collected from banks, banks would not have moved in? What I’m saying is that they are being funded through sources which are not honest. Go around and ask, ‘Why are apartments empty? ’ if you had borrowed money, if you had gone to the bank to borrow money to build, you would ensure that those apartments are fully occupied.”
He added, “Ghanaian banks are not that well, and the balance sheets are not strong enough to give you patient capital to go and develop. The interest rates are just astronomical. You can hardly make it as a developer.”
In related news, Dr Dominic Ayine, the Attorney General and Minister for Justice, who has revealed a list of properties acquired by embattled ex-Buffer Stock Abdul‑Wahab Hannan.
Hanan Abdul-Wahab is at the centre of a major corruption scandal involving the alleged acquisition of high-value properties.
Dr Ayine accused Hanan Abdul-Wahab of acquiring luxury assets by misappropriating public funds during his tenure.
According to the Attorney General, the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) have traced several properties and bank transactions linked to Abdul-Wahab.
Speaking at the press briefing on Wednesday, October 22, 2025, Dr Dominic Ayine detailed, “As is typical of all investigations conducted by the EOCO, contemporaneous tracing of the proceeds of crime has been undertaken and can confirm that the couple purchased a number of high-end real estate properties from their ill-got wealth”.
The properties are as follows:
“Five-bedroom house bought from Chain Homes Limited between February 2019 and December 2020 at a cost of $1,625,000. Of this amount, Ghs5,758,165.00 (equivalent to $230,841.00) was paid directly from the accounts of the investigated entities. The balance was paid in cash to Chain Homes by the couple.
In July 2020, the couple purchased a 3-bedroom house at Cantonments from Golden Coast Developer Ltd at a cost of $600,000.00 using two of their companies- Fa-Hausa Ventures (owned by the wife) and Fa-Hausa Company Limited (owned jointly by the couple). The land documents are registered in the name of the wife.
Between October 2019 and February 2021, the couple purchased plots at Finali’s Airport development site for USD $750,000.00. The total payments were made in cash in the name of Faiza Seidu Wuni. Subsequently, in July 2021, Faiza Seidu Wuni signed a contract with a construction company, Mendanha and Sousa Construction Ltd, at a cost of USD$691,650.00 to construct the shell and core of the building. This excludes the cost of architectural designs from Ansara Architecture Pty Ltd, based in South Africa. The building sitting on three plots is now estimated to be valued at about USD$2,5000,000.00.
The couple purchased 0.32-acre government land from one Anthony Duke Essien, a known government land sales agent named in both the demolition of the Nigerian High Commission and the Sale and demolition of the Bulgarian Consulate. Duke Essian used his sister Antoinette Tsiboe Darko, a staff of the Danquah Institute, as a front, to purchase from the Ministry of Lands and the Land Commission at a price of Ghs307,200. Duke Essien then instantly sold the land to Hanan Abdu-Wahab and received about Ghs2,567,000.00.
The payment came from the criminal proceeds from Buffer Stock through Sawtina Enterprise, through Alqarni Enterprise and Hanan himself to Anthony Duke Essien. On the instruction of his brother, Duke Essien, Antoinette then wrote to the Land Commission in March 2020 to instruct them that the lease should be in the name of Hanan Abdul-Wahab. In May 2020, she made a U-turn and wrote to the Lands Commission to withdraw the documents bearing the name of Hanan Abdul-Wahab and now replace it with his wife, Faiza Seidu Wuni. The couple developed four units of 4-bedroom apartments on the said land. The property is yet to be valued.
Watch the video below:
“The only reason why these high ends buildings in Cantoments and other prime areas are empty is because they were acquired by dishonest means.”- Sam Jonah pic.twitter.com/aWEFBXwwta
— Hubert 𝕏 (@KwesiHubert) October 26, 2025