A flagbearer hopeful of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Kennedy Kwame Ohene Agyapong alias “Scorpion”, has threatened to spill secrets about the governing party that will spell its end.
In an interview with Sompa FM, Kennedy Agyapong, claimed that there was a plot by the government to collapse his companies, including sending officials of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) to go through his books in respect of his fish import and cold store business in Tema.
The Member of Parliament (MP) for Assin Central, is not enthused about what might just pass as an innocuous attempt by the GRA to see whether he is meeting his tax obligations, and he has sounded a word of caution to the party, if the persons deployed to cripple his companies are not withdrawn, he will embark on activities that will also kill the party.
Kennedy Agyapong, lamentedthat for years he ran his companies smoothly under various governments until Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo took over.
He believes he has been targeted on the account of GRA officials visiting his cold store to harass him to make life unbearable as a business owner in the country.
Terming the move as an ‘intimidation’, the MP hammered that he will not kowtow to any attempts to ‘collapse’ his business, insisting that the governments of Jerry John Rawlings, John Agyekum Kufuor, John Atta Mills and John Dramani Mahama never targeted his business.
“You are going there because Kwame Agyapong is a loudmouth. You want to collapse my companies because I want to contest. I’m being nice and charitable to the NPP, but they shouldn’t dare me. Anybody who tries to kill my companies because I’m contesting for elections, I will kill the party.
“The things I know and will say will kill the party. I’ve gone through a lot from January till date but I’ve been very nice. If you want to collapse my company because of one person then I will also kill the company. I’m not afraid of anyone,” he fumed.
“I was informed that people from the Ghana Revenue Authority had stormed my place to check the number of fish I sell in a day.
“Let me state it clearly that I can’t be threatened. They cannot use the system to intimidate because it won’t work. It’s so sad for me to make this statement, when Rawlings was in office I opened businesses, same as president Kufour, Atta Mills and then in Mahama’s era. I never went through any of these harassments. I am sad, I have to tell you the truth, I have never gone through harassment and intimidation as under Akufo-Addo…this is the frustration am going through to set up businesses for Ghanaians. Business owners can testify to what am saying,” he lamented.
Kennedy Agyapong, announced that he will not operate ‘family and friends’ under his government if elected as the next president of Ghana come December 2024.
“I have been a Member of Parliament for 6 consecutive terms…I hear people say my children are many and so they will take over positions. When am president, they will rather work for me. I have a lot of businesses for them to work in,” he added.
Kennedy Agyapong is hoping to lead the NPP into the 2024 election with a campaign to instill discipline and fight corruption.
The NPP flagbearer hopeful also weighed in on the recently published Auditor-general’s report that pointed to fraud and impropriety in spending of COVID-19 funds running into several millions of dollars.
“The performance of NPP during the COVID, I am not holding brief, we have made some mistakes that we all have to accept and I will be the first person to accept,” he said on Metro TV’s Good Evening Ghana program earlier this week.
“But if you compare the two governments, Akufo-Addo and Mahama, Mahama is not an alternative to Ghana because the man has been fortunate to succeed Atta Mills for two years,” he stated stressing that he has no justification to seek a final term in office.
When pushed by host Paul Adom-Otchere about Mahama’s claim that the NPP was corrupt, Agyapong responded: “NPP is corrupt, NDC is corrupt, that is why you have Kennedy Agyapong coming in.”
When he was reminded that he was an NPP man, he replied: “I am a disciplined NPP (member).”
