Mrs. Betty Mould-Iddrisu, Minister of Justice and Attorney-General, on Tuesday said the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Minority in Parliament misconstrued the statement of the Minister of Finance and Economic Planning on judgment debts as presented in the 2010 budget.
She said the Minority, in a press conference held on the issue, sought to create the impression that the Minister of Finance and Economic Planning, Dr. Kwabena Duffuor, was wrong in attributing the huge judgment debts that
the Mills Administration inherited from the NPP government to bad governance and management over the past eight years.
Mrs. Mould-Iddrisu, speaking at a press conference in Accra in reaction to the NPP Minority press conference addressed by Mr. Joe Ghartey, former Attorney-General, said: "in our nature of governance, judgment debts would always be an issue once people had valid claims against government."
However, she said, core principle of Dr. Duffuor's statement was that the prudent and responsible management of these debts would indicate whether we had been effective managers.
She said though some of the debts dated back to the independence period and irrespective of how these judgment debts arose, they were badly managed over the past eight years.
Mrs. Mould-Iddrisu who quoted from the budget statement said the quantum of the judgment debts increased substantially under the NPP
administration.
She said even in situations where local and foreign courts had ruled that payments should be made, the then government was adamant resulting in astronomical compounded interest, loss of profits claims and damages which the new government was compelled to pay.
Mrs. Mould-Iddrisu cited a number of cases of judgment debts, including the Construction Pioneers (CP) case, which the Minority claimed were tainted with fraud and abrogated the contract.
She said CP pursued the case in a foreign court and the foreign arbitration tribunal held the NPP government liable for abrogating four
contracts the company was executing.
Mrs. Mould-Iddrisu said the NPP government refused to settle payment until CP obtained an enforcement order of the arbitral award and the
government was forced to settle to the tune of four million pounds sterling.
"As I speak to you now, there is an amount of $581,333 and 50,778.37 pounds sterling which is outstanding in respect of legal fees for our
foreign solicitors handling this matter," she added.
Mrs. Mould-Iddrisu also cited the Calf Cocoa case which is a joint venture company between a Chinese partner and Caridem Development Company.
She said the matter arose because the NPP government refused to honour a contractual agreement between the government of Ghana and Calf Cocoa for the payment of the $1.8 million as working capital after the construction of the cocoa processing factory.
Mrs. Mould-Iddrisu said when it became clear after the exchange of correspondence that the NPP government did not intend to pay the sum, the
company took the matter to court.
She said in addition to the $1.8 million claimed by the company, the government was ordered to pay an additional sum of $1.75 million towards rehabilitation the factory together with interest.