Special Aide to former President John Mahama, Joyce Bawah Mogtari has said the manner in which the Managing Director of the Ghana Airports Company Limited was dismissed is harsh and inappropriate.

She said the seeming disregard for corporate governance rules in the matter, smacks of impunity.

Speaking in an interview on Prime Morning, Thursday, the former Deputy Transport Minister indicated that the plausible reasons that led to the sacking of Yaw Kwakwa were unfortunate and “totally” unfair.

“I think the manner in which his dismissal has been carried out, even if it does not necessarily fall under the ambit of being illegal, I think it is totally unacceptable. I don’t think that leaders are elected, appointed or nominated to act with impunity.”

“What actually saddens me is not so much the impunity, it’s not the lack of adherence to corporate governance rules but it is actually the fact that the person who would be most affected by this action had no idea. I think that this is totally unfair, there is enormous unfairness in this system today,” she highlighted.

President Akufo-Addo terminated Mr. Kwakwa’s appointment on February 4.

In a letter dated February 4, 2022, addressed to the Company’s Board Chairman, the Transport Minister said, “per a letter No OSP127/22/104 dated on January 31, 2022,” the President has directed the sacking of Mr. Kwakwa.

It is currently unclear why he was sacked but in the last few weeks, the Airport Company and newly established private jet company operated by McDan Aviation have been involved in a back and forth publicly.

But Joyce Bawah Mogtari noted that the termination of the GACL MD’s appointment is surprising, as the Board Chairman of the Company, Paul Adom-Otchere, is yet to receive any sanctions after the controversial Christmas decoration saga.

“It almost appears as if we are focusing more on the minors and ignoring the majors. In any case, in the same window of the Ghana Airports Company Limited, we heard over Christmas, how without following any procurement processes, the newly-appointed Board Chairman, Paul Adom-Otchere, had actually gone out there to procure at a certain exorbitant cost, Christmas decorations for the Airport facility.”

“He was not sanctioned, he wasn’t sacked. I believe that when we live under the constitutional dispensation, we are no longer allowed to take the law into our own hands and issue edicts as we please, just to satisfy our whims and caprices,” she stated.

For a private individual to act with impunity and have state actors actually work in one way or the other to not just feed his interests is worrying.

Joyce Bawah Mogtari (@joyce_bawah),
Special aide to former President John Mahama. pic.twitter.com/ihO4MGoNMr

— Joy Prime (@JoyPrimeTV) February 10, 2022

Meanwhile, she said there is nothing wrong when a private individual decides to run a private jet business. However, "what I actually worry about is the fact that a private individual can take the law into his own hands, act with such impunity and have state actors actually work in one way or the other to feed not just his interest but of course to create the impression that this individual probably has more power even than the persons under whom he is expecting to operate."

"I have no doubt that at the apex of this confusion is President Akufo-Addo himself. Because indeed, there is no way that Minister can possibly sign such a letter and the President will probably not be aware of it," she alleged.