Chief Executive Officer of the National Petroleum Authority (NPA), Edudzi Tamakloe, has argued that the New Patriotic Party’s current criticism of the legal processes involving Bernard Antwi Boasiako, popularly known as Chairman Wontumi, overlooks what he describes as years of warning signs that emerged while the party was in government.
Speaking on TV3, Tamakloe maintained that discussions surrounding Wontumi’s legal troubles should not be reduced to criticism of the judiciary or prosecutors. Instead, he said the focus should be on what he described as the NPP’s failure to respond to concerns that surfaced years before the current criminal proceedings.
“I think the NPP as a political party failed Wontumi and they are hiding that failure by trying to shift the goalpost to other people,” Tamakloe said.
According to him, the first public indication that something was wrong did not come from political opponents or state prosecutors, but from the NPP government’s own Minister for Lands and Natural Resources.
He said the minister publicly raised concerns that Akonta Mining was operating in a forest reserve without the necessary authorisation, describing that disclosure as an early warning that should have prompted action within the governing party.
“The first time that this Wontumi matter became a matter of public conversation was by the Minister for Lands and Natural Resources under the NPP who first raised the issue that Akonta Mining was engaged in a forest without the necessary authorisation. That should have been a red flag for the NPP,” he stated.
Tamakloe argued that because Wontumi served as the party’s Ashanti Regional Chairman, the party had a collective responsibility to ensure that activities linked to him complied with the law.
“This is your regional chairman. This is what he does. It is your collective responsibility to ensure that he does it right,” he added.
