This follows the decision of the prosecution to amend counts 11 and 12 of the 29 charges for which the former SSNIT boss and three other former employees of the trust as well as a private businesswoman, are before the court.
Mr. Thompson, John Hagan Mensah and Juliet Hassana Kramer all pleaded not guilty to the charges which relate to conspiracy to commit crime and willfully causing financial loss to the Republic.
Their lawyers pleaded with the court to admit the accused persons to their old bail and this was not opposed by the prosecution led by the Director of Public Prosecutions, Yvonne Atakora Obuobisa.
The court presided over by Justice Henry Anthony Kwofie, a Justice of the Court of Appeal sitting as an additional High Court judge, then granted the oral application.
The court subsequently adjourned the matter to November 5, 2021 for case management conference to set out how the trial would be carried out.
Main Trial
Apart from the Ex-SSNIT boss, then General Manager of Management Information Systems at SSNIT, Caleb Kwaku Afaglo, then General Counsel of SSNIT, Peter Hayibor, as well as John Hagan Mensah, Information Technology Infrastructure Manager of SSNIT and Juliet Hassana Kramer are on trial.
The five are facing 29 counts of conspiracy, willfully causing financial loss to the Republic, defrauding by false pretences as well as the contravention of Public Procurement Act contrary to Section 92(2)(a) of the Public Procurement Act, 2003 (Act 663).
The charges generally related to payments made under the Operational Business Suite project which the prosecution said had already been paid for under the controversial OBS contract.
Detailed Charges
The ex-SSNIT boss Ernest Thompson, John Hagan Mensah, Juliet Hassana Kramer, and Caleb Afaglo have been charged with 18 counts of willfully causing financial loss of $14,803,299.5 to the state between September 2013 and April 2016.
The charge sheet indicated that Ernest Thompson, John Hagan Mensah, Juliet Hassana Kramer and Caleb Afaglo between December 2015 and April 2016 caused a financial loss of $5,465,909.14 to the state by causing payment to be made under “Change Order 7 for the purchase of IBM advanced hardware (2 Enterprise Class IBM Power8 E870, 2 Clustered V9000 flash systems, 1 V9000 system for disaster) recovery for Operational Business Suite project when same had already been paid under the Operational Business Suite Contract.”
Mr. Thompson, Mrs. Kramer and Peter Hayibor are also facing a charge of willfully causing a financial loss of $5,141,905.66 to the state by back-dating the warranty and Service Level Agreement of the Operational Business Suite project between January and September 2016.
Again, Ernest Thompson, John Hagan Mensah and Juliet Hassana Kramer have been accused of willfully causing financial loss of $2,292,048.23 to the state when they caused payment to be made “under Change Order 2 for the upgrade of hardware for the Operational Business Suite project when same had already been paid under the Operational Business Suite contract.
Perfect Business System
Juliet Hassana Kramer is also facing charges of having between October 2011 and May 2017 defrauding SSNIT of the sum of $66,783,148.08 under a contract to Perfect Business Systems (PBS) Limited, a non-existent company and Silverlake Structured Services by representing that she was the Chief Executive Officer of PBS and Silverlake, authorised to sign on behalf of Silverlake, the tenderer of the OBS contract.
Mr. Thompson is also facing a charge of contravening the PPA Act by approving the sum of $9,536,652.50 for “Change Request for the Operational Business Suite Project, an amount which is above the threshold of the head of the entity.”
Forged Certificate
Caleb Afaglo is facing charges of possession and altering of forged Bachelor of Science in Computer Studies from Georgia Institute of Technology.
---Daily Guide