Public Agenda (Accra)
Selorm Amevor
24 November 2008
Accra — A Financial and Economic crime fighting group called Frank Rivers Morren says it is rolling out a series of seminars and security programmes to equip investors and the public to be able to smoke out fraudsters of all shapes who will invade Ghana when the oil starts rolling out in 2010.
The Chief Executive of the Group, Mr. Frank Rivers Morren, told Public Agenda that if measures were not taken to make life unbearable for the fraudsters to operate in the country, the oil discovery and the expected revenue would elude Ghanaians.
His worry is based on his belief that most of the fraudsters have links within the security and the judiciary services, so in most cases the police and the judiciary are ineffectual in rooting out corruption.
Mr. Morren said that with the judiciary being perceived to be corrupt, companies and investors should not wait to be defrauded before seeking refund of their money since the judiciary in the country can easily be corrupted by these syndicates.
"We are not creating the appropriate institutions to operate effectively but rather demigods out of people," he said.
In his view, the failure of the security agencies, the judiciary and other state organs to fight corruption is ample justification to carry the fight to the fraudsters through sharing of experiences and promotion of best practices
He said an aspect that has been overlooked by government and all stakeholders is the activities of these fraudsters who thrive on offering their victims juicy but unrealistic offers.
"These fraudsters tell their victims that they have connections in government and can help them get oil at cheaper rates or even get them to drill oil in the country," he added.
He was therefore hopeful that the seminars would educate major stakeholders like investors and banks of the existence of such highly sophisticated network and the extent to which they must be alert, detect and avoid such crimes from happening.
He indicated that the government unfortunately has not gotten the resources to deal with the educative aspect of crime prevention, but is only able to pass legislative instruments to protect investors.
"The unfortunate aspect of the issue is that if an investor is duped millions of dollars, even when the case goes to court it is mostly impossible to recoup the amount lost and even sometimes these people are left off the hook," he added.
He indicates that the targeted group of these fraudsters includes multinational companies, multilateral investors from countries like Britain, Japan, United States of America, Germany, United Arab Emirates etc.
Mr. Morren said that his outfit is not going to use crime fighting equipments but rather a human resource anti-fraud unit to fight such criminals.
"We are going to educate investors on what to look out for when they either receive mails or telephone calls from supposed businessmen so they don't fall prey to these fraud syndicates," he said.
With a background in Financial and Economic Research the CEO hopes to use his research work and expertise to disseminate information to the investor community about the activities of these fraudsters.
Asked whether he was in link with the security agencies in the country he said that the attitude of the security agencies towards the issue of fraud makes him doubt the interest they have in fighting the activities of such fraudster.
He indicated that in recent years the country has become a hub for the activities of internet fraudsters who go to the banks to cash their money and even on certain occasions such people even have police escorts to help them carry their booty home.
Also he said that the poor remunerations of the police makes them very vulnerable to these fraudsters who are mostly ready to spend huge amounts of money to have their way.
He therefore called on government to ensure that institutions are effective in the discharge of their duties to ensure that the country makes maximum profit from the oil discovery as well as other natural resources of the country.
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