The legislator at the centre of the motion to have the AMERI agreement rescinded, K.T. Hammond, says his own independent investigations into the deal also reveal Ghana will lose at least $150 million to AMERI.
Speaking on Eyewitness News, Mr. Hammond said his motion was “on the basis of very clear evidence of a few contracts that have been signed by AMERI and some other companies.”
He stressed that “what is at stake is an amount as big as $150 million dollars” and this amount “was going to go to the AMERI company.”
Mr. Hammond notably seconded the motion for the agreement between the Mahama administration and the Africa and Middle East Resources Investment Group’s (AMERI Energy) to rent the 300MW of emergency power from AMERI at the peak of the country’s power crisis which cost $510 million.
But Mr. Hammond says his motion to reverse the deal is because “documents have come to my attention, which, with the benefit of hindsight, would not have led me to support the motion [in 2015] the way I did.”
He maintained that AMERI misled the whole House saying, “it is not a question that Parliament did not do its work diligently or Parliament didn’t get value for money. We are talking about misrepresentation.
KT not privy Philip Addison committee report
Mr. Hammond’s conclusion highlighting that Ghana will lose $150 million bears some similarity to the conclusion by the Philip Addison committee charged to review AMERI power deal.
“I hear that Philip Addison and other colleagues were tasked to undertake some investigation. I am not aware of any official report resulting from the committee’s hearing,” the MP said with respect to those findings.
Before Mr. Hammond filed his motion, the Philip Addison committee recommended that the AMERI deal be renegotiated or abrogated on grounds of fraud, after it concluded that Ghana was made to pay $150 million extra in commission.
Ameri in its agreement with Government dated February 10th, 2015, charged Ghana significantly higher than what it was charged by the Turkish registered company, PPR, which financed and executed the project.
The Turkish firm pegged the total cost of the project at a maximum of $360 million.
However, in the Build Operate Own Transfer (BOOT) agreement signed between the government and AMERI, the deal was pegged at a minimum of 510 million dollars leaving Ameri with a commission of $150 million.
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