Kwasi Kwarteng of Ghana’s New Patriotic Party (NPP) says taxpayers want the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) to identify the suspects in the Aksa bribery scandal, rather than focus only on people classified as persons of interest.
Speaking on TV3’s Key Points programme on Saturday, 29 August, Mr Kwarteng, a member of the NPP’s Communications team, said the distinction did not reflect the concerns of the public.
“As a taxpayer, I am not interested in persons of interest. We are interested in suspects,” he said.
He added: “The whole idea about persons of interest is just to water down the impact of what is going on.”
The comments follow the Special Prosecutor’s announcement that several people in Ghana had been identified as persons of interest in the Aksa Enerji Uretim A.S. deal. Kissi Agyebeng said the individuals were being investigated, while stressing that the classification did not amount to an accusation of criminal wrongdoing.
At a press conference in Accra on 26 August, Mr Agyebeng said the OSP had been “carefully investigating the Ghana dimension, and our public silence has not meant inaction”.
He named the main persons of interest as Kwabena Donkor, who was at all times Minister of Power; Francis Walkson Kwesi Dzata, who was at all times Technical Advisor to the Minister of Power; Solomon Adjetey Sowah, who was at all times a Deputy Director at the Ministry of Power; Lyndon George Nii Saul Mettle, who was at all times a Director at Tricorp Group Limited; and Baffour Ankoma Brobbey, who was at all times an employee at Tricorp Group Limited.
The Special Prosecutor also said other persons of interest included present and former employees of the Volta River Authority, Ghana Grid Company Limited, Electricity Company of Ghana and Public Utilities and Regulatory Commission. Some staff of the entity formerly known as the Ministry of Power were also included.
Mr Agyebeng said the legal distinction between a person of interest and a suspect was important.
“a person of interest is not necessarily a suspect. The two categories are distinct investigative classifications and should not be treated as interchangeable. Then again, identification in either category does not constitute criminal culpability or conviction until guilt is proved beyond reasonable doubt to the satisfaction of a court of competent jurisdiction.”
The OSP has provided investigative and evidentiary assistance to the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) under Ghana’s established mutual legal assistance framework.
Mr Agyebeng said the United States Department of Justice had acknowledged the OSP’s contribution as providing “significant assistance” to the prosecution. He said the conviction in the United States demonstrated the importance of international co-operation when investigating and prosecuting complex corruption cases involving several jurisdictions.
However, he cautioned that the OSP’s work did not end with its assistance to US authorities. The office was continuing to examine the Ghanaian aspect of the case, he said, adding that a conviction in a foreign country did not automatically establish criminal liability under Ghanaian law or justify prosecuting other people in Ghana.
“Each person’s acts must be assessed under Ghanaian law, using lawfully obtained evidence capable of supporting a prosecution here. The nature of the evidence and the applicable law determine whether prosecution should be commenced in Ghana or otherwise,” he said.
The investigation follows the conviction of Asante Kwaku Berko by a federal jury in Brooklyn, New York, on 6 August 2026. Mr Berko, a dual citizen of Ghana and the United States, was found guilty of conspiring to pay and paying more than $1m in bribes to multiple Ghanaian officials between 2014 and 2015.
The payments were linked to the development and financing of a 370-megawatt fuel-oil plant in Tema under an agreement between the Republic of Ghana and Aksa Enerji Uretim A.S., a Turkish energy company and Goldman Sachs client.
Mr Berko is a former Managing Director of Tema Oil Refinery and a former Executive Director in the Investment Banking Division of the US-based Goldman Sachs group.
