The former deputy finance minister Cassiel Ato Forson has been charged by the health minister Kwaku Agyemang-Manu of allowing payments to an ambulance provider in violation of the contract's explicit provisions.
According to Mr. Manu, the contract's provisions mandated that payment not be made until the delivery of the automobiles. He clarified that inspection had to be done before the automobiles were sent.
"...the Ministry of Finance instructed Bank of Ghana to set up letters of credit in a letter. That was written by the first defendant, the Honorable Ato Forson, who was the time's deputy minister of finance.
Without consulting the Ministry of Health or the commercial contract that Big Sea and the Ministry of Health signed, this letter was written.
The clause in the contract agreement that required there to be no prior payments and that the vehicles must be delivered before payment is made was not mentioned, according to Mr. Manu.
The third witness for the prosecution in the case against Dr. Forson and two other people is Mr. Agyemang Manu.
They have been accused of a number of offences, including depriving the government of money by importing 30 ambulances as part of a consignment of 200 in accordance with a 2012 agreement between the Ministry and the Dubai-based company Big Sea Limited.
On Thursday, July 2021, Mr. Manu finished the testimony he had begun on June 28.
He added that the government was not upholding its half of the deal after the contract for the delivery of ambulances and all agreements had been ratified. He said that Big Sea sent notice of its intention to suit in a letter to the Attorney General. Big Sea, according to him, was dissatisfied that the government was not carrying out the pre-shipment inspection as was agreed.
He said that the Attorney General's Office wrote to the Ministry of Health encouraging the government to abide by the contract's conditions or find a method to get out of them since they were legally binding and breaking them would result in a judgement debt. After receiving the letter from Big Sea announcing its intention to sue, it did this.
He disclosed that the Attorney General received a response from the Ministry of Health stating that the contract could not be fulfilled.
The primary justification offered was that there were no funds available for the financing agreement's execution because, according to the parliamentary approval for the financing agreement, Stanbic Bank was to be the source of funding. However, at the time, the ministry was not aware of any credit agreement between the Ministry of Finance and Stanbic Bank.
According to Mr. Manu, Dr. Forson wrote to the Bank of Ghana following the completion of this letter. He claimed that this action was against the terms of the contract.
He said that the first 10 cars entered the nation shortly after, but the Ambulance Service soon discovered they were flawed.
He stated, "Big Sea was made aware of the flaw and the business accepted the flaw."
In order to verify that the flaws are rectified, the firm, he stated, requested representatives of the Ministry to visit its production site in Dubai.
He argued that Big Sea's repeated postponements of the visit date prevented this invitation from materialising.
Big Sea, he claimed, kept bringing more automobiles into the nation.
"The Ministry responded to Big Sea in writing, bringing Big Sea's attention to the need for correction" (fixing defects) The decision to halt the contract for the supply of the ambulance was subsequently communicated in writing by the Ministry of Health to the Ministry of Finance, according to him.
He went on to say that the Ministry of Health ultimately sent the technical team to Big Sea in Dubai, but the business was unable to correct the flaws.
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