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Ghana President Orders Graft Probe of Soccer Body Chief

Ghana President Orders Graft Probe of Soccer Body Chief

(Bloomberg) -- Ghana’s President Nana Akufo-Addo ordered a probe into the conduct of the head of the country’s soccer association due to alleged fraud, according to his office.

Akufo-Addo was shown a video recording in which Ghana Football Association President Kwesi Nyantakyi used the name of the West African nation’s leader and other government officials to “induce supposed investors into the country to part with various sums of monies,” Samuel Abu Jinapor, the presidency’s deputy chief of staff, said in a broadcast Tuesday on Accra-based Citi FM. “The president is fully satisfied that a prima facie case has been established for criminal investigations to be launched.”

Calls to Nyantakyi’s mobile phone didn’t connect. He’s been head of the soccer association since 2005 and is an executive committee member at the Confederation of African Football.

Since coming to power in January last year, the government of Akufo-Addo has pledged to crack down on pervasive graft in the West African nation. So far, the highest-profile investigation has been of the former chief executive officer of the nation’s cocoa regulator, Stephen Opuni, who’s alleged to have influenced the award of contracts worth $65.8 million to supply fertilizer.

Other cases include the former CEO of a state-run microfinance fund and at least five ex-ministers who may have received a double salary under the previous government. Earlier this month, Akufo-Addo suspended four High Court judges in connection with bribery allegations.

To contact the reporter on this story: Ekow Dontoh in Accra at edontoh@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Andre Janse van Vuuren at ajansevanvuu@bloomberg.net, Alastair Reed

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