An infuriated Kobby Akyeampong, 0utgoing National Coordinator of the Ghana Youth Employment and Entrepreneurial Agency (GYEEDA) now Youth Employment Authority (YEA), yesterday created a disturbing scene at the head office of the agency when he caused the arrest of the Human Resource Manager, Selorm Attipoe, accusing him of causing financial loss to the state.
That was not all; as the man in charge of the disability section of the agency, Jacob Adongo, claimed that the outgoing coordinator had slapped him, an accusation Kobby Akyeampong denied.
Selorm Attipoe was, upon the instructions of Kobby Akyeampong, handcuffed by three security officers in mufti, suspected to be BNI operatives, who whisked him away in a car with registration number CR 3001-13 around 11:15pm.
The BNI operatives did not take kindly to the pictorial capture of the nasty scene which unfolded at the offices of GYEEDA near the Ridge Hospital, as they descended upon a Joy FM reporter for taking pictures.
A no-love-lost relationship exists between Kobby Akyeampong and the human resource man, DAILY GUIDE learnt, with the government appointee accusing his subordinate of instigating some aggrieved workers against him.
Jacob Atule Adongo, on his part, accused Kobby of giving him two ‘dirty’ slaps.
Adongo, a visually impaired employee who heads the Disability Desk at GYEEDA, stated on Asempa FM’s Ekosii Sen programme on Friday that he was slapped by his boss.
According to him, Akyeampong gave him double slaps after he accidentally stepped on the NDC guru’s foot while trying to navigate around the GYEEDA building.
Mr Akyeampong accused Adongo as well of instigating some aggrieved workers against him.
Mr Akyeampong denied the allegation of slapping the visually impaired Adongo, insisting, “I only pushed him aside”.
“I was coming into the building after going outside for some time. I encountered Adongo who was approaching me; I pushed him aside and asked why even though there was somebody leading him, he was still stepping on toes…,” he told Asempa Fm.
Adongo, he said, was leading the crusade to cause trouble for him.
“One of GYEEDA’s cars is currently at the Ange Hill Hotel for about two years now because he failed to pay for a programme he held there…Because of that I have seized his salary for some time. He just came to apologise and I released half to him,” the outgoing GYEEDA boss said.
He said Adongo had been hiding behind his disability to cause problems at the agency.
But Adongo insisted that his boss actually gave him the double slap.
“I am just shocked that Kobby says he did not slap me…” he stated, adding that he believed the CCTV cameras at the offices of GYEEDA captured the episode.
“If Kobby fears God that we all worship…let’s go and watch the CCTV cameras in our office…if Kobby did not slap me, I should not live to see tomorrow….,” he said.
New Recruitment Some workers of the agency accused Mr Akyeampong, who had been sent to GIFEC in a recent reshuffle of heads of state agencies, of employing his cronies to fill non-existent positions before leaving office.
On Thursday, scores of workers of GYEEDA massed up at the offices of the agency demanding a immediate halt to the ongoing recruitment process.
The aggrieved workers claimed that the recruitment exercise was on the blind side of the head of human resources.
According to the workers, Mr Akyeampong claimed that vacancies had been created following deaths, transfer of staff and dismissals, a claim the workers disputed.
Recruitment Justification The outgoing National Coordinator justified the recruitment on Joy Fm, claiming that the agency required a certain number of staff including visually challenged persons to fill existing vacancies.
Mr Akyeampong said allegations that he did not seek financial clearancebefore proceeding with the recruitment “are funny” because the agency does not get paid from the Controller and Accountant General’s Department.
Beef With HR Head He said the HR manager was bitter because he stopped the illegal payment to some 188 people.
“After the Public Service had conducted an interview for persons who were supposed to be migrated from contract basis to single spine salary structure, they came out with a report on September 15, 2012 which spelt out clearly who qualified to be employed.
“One eighty eight people had problems and the majority of it wa that they did not provide their certificates to enable them to be interviewed,” he quoted the report.
According to him, the HR head, who himself was not appointed but assumed the position, virtually smuggled 188 people onto the payroll.
“I stopped the 188 people from being paid because I thought that was completely wrong and that has been my bane all the time. He (HR) organises these people to come and demonstrate against me,” he said.
The outgoing National Coordinator revealed that before he stopped the payments, the 188 people had been paid GH¢892,000.
The Audit Report of 2013 mentioned the HR Director again as having unilaterally put another set of 19 people on the payroll, Kobby Akyeampong stated, adding that the audit report concluded that he should be sanctioned.
A research Kobby claimed to have conducted revealed that Mr Attipoe assumed his position unilaterally with no appointment letter backing it.
“His own actions testify that he is not even qualified to hold that position,” Mr Akyeampong said.
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