The easiest stories are always made known, the difficult part, with little or no evidence can best be put in a fictional form to facilitate the individual thought in understanding what might have actually happened or not happen. Victor Brachie…

President George Amponsah woke up from his bed with a new zeal accompanied with an immediate remembrance of what happened yesterday, when it was all over the news that the deal between his government, Ghana National Petroleum Company and an American company by name as Aielion had turned out to be wrong from within an underground deal.

Right on the other side of his bed was the first lady, Mrs. Amponsah, with a slight overview of what she perceived to be the face of the man she had married almost 34years ago, in a small village, somewhere in the central region, with only a few people turning up which seemed to be different when the two set their feet out these days.

That morning, every page in the newspapers was all about the “Gone bad oil deal”, which might bring the country into a total shame and huge loss of income from the oil sector.

This bruising battle between the government and the state oil company on one hand and American oil company Aielion Energy on the other was yet to see the real danger ahead in times to come.

The American oil company had announced that it wanted to sell its stake in the country’s Jubilee oil field to the giant Annex Corporation in an exclusive deal for US$4.2billion, to them, it was a fine deal.

After such intentions of Aielion Energy, President George’s government blocked the deal, initially because of the complex dispute between the Ghana National Petroleum Company and Aielion about the company’s use of Ghana’s geophysical data in the sale negotiation and a later forged signature of the energy minister.

The rains started to pour; President George still had sweat all over his face, wondering how he was going to solve this issue that was confronting him and his administration.

He looked through the windscreen of his car and kept reminding himself of a possible twist that could save him from a total financial loss and personal disgrace.

He immediately picked up his phone and called the Attorney General, Mrs. Julia Prempeh to immediately charge Aielion local partners, Ahamrin group, with contravening corporate and anti-corruption laws and forgery of signature. Ahamrin, which drew up the original petroleum agreement and had brought Aielion to Ghana and secured a 3.5% interest in the West Cape Three Points oil block which helped Aielion to negotiate with the GNPC in 2004.

Mrs. Julia Prempeh raised concern over such an action, making it straight that such an action will ginger political attack from the opposition party, thus in a further complication, the two Ahamrin directors, Francis Dei and Kojo Espoire, were friends of former President Edward Freh, under whose government their oil contract was secured.

President George went blunt for a while, he knew how truthful what the Attorney General was saying was, but what could he do next, if there was any new idea, he would have chosen such to prevent any verbal political war from the opposition.

Besides, should the Aielion sale go through, Francis Dei and Kojo Espoire and any other beneficial shareholders in the Ahamrin may gain $200 million and so become Ghana’s first oil multimillionaires, which could be the next fund for the opposition party to improve their strength in winning the next elections.

It was all clear to the President now, should he over-look and allow for the finalizing of the deals on behalf of Aielion, his downfall and end of his political power will come to pass, if he also goes ahead and prevent the deal, he has not been patriotic for putting his integrity first before the development of the nation which he governs.

President George sat in his car, totally out of his body; he tuned in to one of the top radio stations in the country and silently paid attention to what a financial analyst had to say on the radio concerning the deal.

The financial analyst said that whatever the president decided will come back haunting him and that he would face an organized opposition. If the President approves the Aielion-Ahamrin sale, his own political members will slam him for rubber-stamping a former President Edward Freh –era deal which might hugely benefit his political opponent.

Yet if President George also rejects the deal, he will face opprobrium from the opposition and many business people, who were hoping for substantial commercial gains if Annex Corporation came to Ghana.

George and his government would have to be convinced that any alternative strategy to the Aielion-Annex Corporation sale would generate more revenue and contribute more effectively to the integrated oil and gas industry the government wants….

This writing is fictional and any resemblances being it name or association is highly coincidental.

Part of this work was proudly produced by Africa Confidential 23 July 2010-vol 51-N*15