arbitration / adr news
London Court throws out AG, others for sleeping on $170m case 22 June 2021
The Commercial Court in London, has refused to allow Ghana to bring a belated challenge to an UNCITRAL award worth over US$134 million in favour of a power contractor, ruling that national elections and COVID-19 pandemic, did not make the state’s delay reasonable. The case started under Gloria Afua Akuffo, when she was the Minister of Justice with Godfred Yeboah Dame as her Deputy. State attorneys, including Helen Akpene Awo Ziwu, Anna Pearl Akiwumi Siriboe and Grace Oppong Dolphy in Accra, were also mentioned in the case as having failed to beat a 28-day deadline. However, the State Attorneys together with Godfred Yeboah Dame, who took over from Gloria Afua Akuffo, went sleeping on the job, leading to a delay in contesting the judgment debt. The result of that deep sleep is that, the poverty-stricken Ghana, will be paying a whopping US$170 million in damages to the claimants; Ghana Power Generation Company (GPGC) located at 1 Airport Square Building, 7TH Floor, Accra. Godfred Dame and his subordinates’ attempts to hide behind the 2020 general election and the COVID-19 pandemic as excuses for the delay, was rebuffed by the London court. In a ruling on Wednesday June 8, Mr Justice Butcher, refused to grant the government a time extension to apply to set aside the award – adding that the state’s grounds for challenging it were “intrinsically weak”. Global Arbitration Review previously reported on the award in favour of GPGC against Ghana. GPGC was represented before the court by Charles Kimmins QC and Mark Tushingham, where Ghana was said to have been too late to challenge the decision against it. Source: Myjoyonline.com |
