Ex-Ghana Officials To Declare Assets

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31144, 22 August 1966, Page 13

Ex-Ghana Officials To Declare Assets

CV.Z. Press Association —Copyright)

ACCRA, August 21.

All former Cabinet ministers, regional commissioners, district commissioners and some civil servants who held office between March 6. 1957 —Ghana’s independence day—and the day before the February 24 coup this year have been called upon by the Government to declare their assets, the Associated Press reported.

The measure, entitled “The investigation and forfeiture of assets decree," has a retrospective effect from the day of the coup.

fines, five-year gaol sentences, or both. Most of the people affected, particularly the former ministers and activists of the proscribed Convention Peoples’ Party, are in protective custody, and it has been learned they are being supplied with a questionnaire under the decree. Informed sources express the belief that former officials’ ill-gotten gains may total more than 140 million dollars inside and outside Ghana, with the former president, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, having about half that amount. A difficulty is that these men are believed to have invested the money in other peoples’ names and may be able to sit tight on such assets, even if they declare those in their own names.

Offences under it are punishable by 16,000 dollars

Shortly after the coup, the Government froze local assets of all ministers and former officials.