The High Court in Accra will, on April 16, deliver its judgement in the trial of former CEO of the Microfinance and Small Loans Centre, MASLOC, Sedinam Tamakloe Attionu, and former Operations Manager of the Centre, Daniel Axim.
The two are facing 78 charges of conspiracy, wilfully causing financial loss to the state, stealing, and causing loss to public property, among others.
Madam Tamakloe Attionu has since October 2021 failed to be present for the trial following an approval by the court to travel out of the country for a medical checkup. The court accordingly declared her absconded and further ruled that her trial would be done in absentia.
Following that decision, the Court ordered the two sureties of Madam Tamakloe Attionu, a former CEO of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation, Alex Mould, and actor Gavivina Tamakloe, to pay the five million cedis bail bond to the state for failing to produce the accused person.
Prior to that, the court had on several occasions granted the sureties time to produce Madam Tamakloe Attionu. The sureties, however, informed the court that they had exhausted all efforts within their means but had been unsuccessful at producing the accused person. The state called four witnesses to prove its case against the accused. Daniel Axim denied allegations of conspiring with the former CEO of MASLOC to steal monies belonging to the Centre.
In his defence, he said that as Head of Operations, he received instructions from Madam Tamakloe Attionu to prepare a memo for the release of funds to support her sensitization programmes across the country. He said, per the custom of MASLOC, staff were to comply with instructions from the CEO, who is politically assigned, or risk being dismissed.
Mr Axim said, being a public officer, he complied with the orders of the CEO, often approved by the Board of Governors, to draft memos for the release of the said monies. He admitted collecting the monies stated in the charge sheet from the Head of Finance but gave the same to Madam Tamakloe Attionu on her instructions. Barring any changes, the High Court will deliver its judgement and the fate of the two accused persons will be known.
