The Board of Metro Mass Transit Service has cited Managing Director, John Noble Appiah, for overstepping his bounds in the running of the company.
A query letter intercepted by Luv News, accuses the M.D. of defying the board in the award of contracts and recruiting staff without the board’s approval, among other breaches.
An audit by PKF covering the period between July 2013 and June 2014 raised questions about procurement irregularities against Mr. Appiah.
He is found to have spent over 33 million Ghana cedis without approval for which the board is demanding answers.
The letter, dated 29 September, 2014, and signed by Board Chairman, Osabarima Ansah Sasraku, copied to the Transport Minister, accuses Mr. Appiah of defying the board’s directive to award a contract for the supply of 400 tyres valued at 604,800 cedis to Allied Home Stores, and instead handed the deal to Rana Motors.
That happened after a warning letter to the MD for earlier breaches for which Mr. Appiah apologized.
The board also alleges that while the MD awarded the contract to Rana Motors on 22 July 2014, he communicated to the board on 22 August that he was continuing negotiation with Allied Home Stores on the contract.
The query letter indicates the MD implemented the 2014 procurement plan before presenting it to the board
It refers to an advertisement in the 25th March edition of the Ghanaian Times on tenders for the procurement of items in the 2014 plan, the same day it was submitted to the board for approval.
Mr. Appiah, according to the board, engaged in operational staff recruitment – without the board or the Transport Ministry – for buses to be imported from China though the deal was yet to be concluded.
It is unclear what responses Mr. Appiah gave but sources at the MMT indicate he was out of office for about three weeks during which he was under investigation by the Economic and Organized Crime Unit.
Attempts to get a confirmation or otherwise from EOCO on the issue have been unsuccessful.
Mr. Appiah has meanwhile returned to post.
