Mr Appiah-Mensah, aka Nam1, is being accused of defrauding by false pretense following his failure to pay either the principal or dividends of Menzgold customers.
'Show up, You have not defrauded anyone'- Bulldog tells Nam1
The artiste and repertoire manager at Zylofon media, Bulldog, is pleading with his boss and CEO of Menzgold, Nana Appiah Mensah, to show up after a bench warrant was issued for his arrest.
Nam1 is said to have sneaked out of Ghana after the Economic and Organised Crime Officer (EOCO) commenced investigation on him.
In a widely circulated video, Bulldog, born Lawrence Nana Asiama Hanson, urged him to report himself to the police because he will not be jailed.
He said: “If what I’m hearing about the arrest warrant is true, show up; you will not be jailed. None of your people will be jailed, you have not defrauded anybody.
"You have good a case, You were running your business until this present administration showed up," he said.
According to the former manager of Dancehall artiste Shatta Wale, Menzgold was running successfully until the Akufo-Addo administration "messed things up."
"If you felt that Menzgold dealings were wrong, there were better ways to go at it. You came in to mess things up, not to protect customers," he said.
Customers of Menzgold have called on government to intervene in the matter so they can retrieve their locked capital.
However, a statement signed by the Information Minister, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, said the customers since April 2016 ignored several warnings by the Bank of Ghana and the Securities and Exchange Commission not to do business with Menzgold.
According to government, even though it sympathizes with the misfortune of the customers, it will only ensure that CEO of the troubled gold firm Nana Appiah Mensah is arrested and prosecuted according to the laws of the country.
“Menzgold was not licensed by BoG or SEC and its operations were not regulated by BoG or SEC. This warning was made as far back as April 2016, and, unfortunately, was disregarded by many customers of Menzgold. BoG and SEC are, therefore, not clothed with any legal mandate to refund monies to clients.
“In the case of banks and specialized deposit-taking institutions, as well as asset management companies licensed and regulated by BOG and SEC, owing to the fact that these companies were regulated by BoG and SEC, the regulators are clothed with the legal mandate to intervene in their matters, in accordance with law. DKM, for example, was licensed by the BoG, the reason for which it stepped in to help retrieve the monies of depositors. In the case of Menzgold, it operated as a trading company and falls outside the scope of the regulators’ intervention,” parts of the statement read.
The statement added that “while government sympathizes with customers on the difficulties encountered in their transaction with the company, the State cannot and will not resort to the use of taxpayer’s monies to refund customers monies”.
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