Cecilia Dapaah used aliases to conceal transactions from undeclared real estate business

Court documents filed by the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) have disclosed that the former Sanitation Minister, Cecilia Dapaah uses aliases to conceal transactions from undeclared real estate business.

“The OSP’s criminal intelligence further suggested that the first respondent, as a Minister of State, was engaged in an undisclosed and undeclared real estate business in which she obscured and concealed the transactions by employing the use of aliases to avoid detection of the actual ownership of the business and properties, while cleverly receiving the proceeds of the transactions in her bank accounts and investments.”

A document by the OSP sighted by our sources also revealed that “criminal intelligence suggested that the first respondent had unexplained large cash sums of money (far above her income as a Minister of State) secreted and stashed up in her residence; and that her house-helps had allegedly helped themselves to part of said sums of money through larceny.”

This is the latest action by the Office of the Special Prosecutor to confirm the seizure of suspected tainted properties belonging to Cecilia Dapaah.

“There are no financial records and traces of the origin(s) of the money reportedly stolen from the residence of the respondents and the money discovered by the OSP at said residence. Further, there is no evidence of the amounts of money having been derived from any legitimate businesses, profession or vocation, and no evidence of said amounts having been lawfully declared and subjected to any statutory payments.

“During the search conducted in her presence, the first respondent disavowed and claimed no knowledge of the presence of the said cash sums in the residence. The conduct of the first respondent, being a public officer, heightened the suspicion of the authorised officers of the OSP that the cash sums were tainted property.”

This comes after the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) on Monday, September 11, filed a motion at the High Court seeking confirmation of seizure and freezing orders of the financial assets of former Minister of Sanitation and Water Resources, Cecilia Dapaah.

A hearing has been slated for October 18, 2023.

The Cedi and Dollar bank accounts belonging to the former minister were frozen by the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) on August 9 but the High Court in Accra on August 31 overturned the decision.

The court ordered that funds seized from the former minister be returned to her within seven days and also directed the OSP to unfreeze Cecilia Dapaah’s accounts.

The OSP subsequently invoked its powers to retake custody of the money, days after the High Court asked the office to return the seized money.