Police declares lawyer wanted

Story: Albert K. Salia & Rosalind Amoh
THE Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service has declared Mr Sarfo Abebrese, Chairman of the Supporters Union of Ghana (SUGHA), wanted.
It said Sarfo Abebrese was being wanted to assist in investigations lodged against him by various complainants who alleged that they had been defrauded by him.
As of the time of going to press, Sarfo Abebrese was said to have collected GH¢40,706 (¢407,060,000) and $93,910 from a number of people to secure visas for them.
While the police had declared him wanted, some victims of the alleged fraud have petitioned the Inspector General of Police to urge his men to expedite action on investigations into the complaints.
The Director-General of the CID, Mr David Asante-Apeatu, told the Daily Graphic yesterday that the new complaints were unrelated to the case in court.
He said anyone who knew his whereabouts should kindly notify the nearest police station or the Documents and Visa Fraud Unit of the CID headquarters, which was investigating the complaints.
The Daily Graphic in its August 6, 2007 edition published that the police were investigating an alleged $14,800 and GH¢1,380 (¢138 million) fraud involving Mr Abebrese.
He is alleged to have collected the money from a number of people between January and September 2006, with the promise of securing them visas to travel to Germany and the United Kingdom to cheer the national senior football team, the Black Stars.
Following that publication about 40 persons lodged new complaints against him, for allegedly defrauding them of various sums of money, which was carried in the August 10, 2007, edition of the Daily Graphic.
The complainants, who came from various parts of the country, alleged that Mr Abebrese charged them various sums of money to help them secure visas to travel to the United States of America.
While some of the complainants claimed that after collecting the money they had not seen him, others alleged that Mr Abebrese issued cheques to them as a refund but were dishonoured.
Most of the new complaints were about Mr Abebrese charging the victims, including consultation fees of $250 and $500, to secure US visas for them.
Those complaints were not even related to football but persons who had won US DV-Lottery.
Mr Asante-Apeatu said since the new complaints were not related to the case in court, it was important that Sarfo Abebrese came to respond to the allegations and assist in investigations.
He, however, said he had been elusive with the police hence the decision to declare him wanted.
In their petition, the victims said completion of investigations could help them retrieve their monies, running into thousands of dollars and millions of cedis, paid to the group in a bid to travel abroad to support the Black Stars in some international friendly matches.
More than 25 people, none of whom are actual SUGHA members, with Godfred Owusu and Eric Baffoe Nyarko as their spokespersons, said some of them had been rendered jobless as their working capital had been held up by SUGHA and its President, Sarfo Abebrese.
The group had originally petitioned the Minister of Education, Science and Sports but have re-petitioned the IGP after the Daily Graphic reported last week that the police were investigating SUGHA and its President for the alleged fraud.
The spokespersons said they had to re-petition the IGP because earlier attempts to get the police to hasten the process of retrieving their monies failed as the promise made by Mr Abebrese to refund the money was not honoured and they could not get in touch with him.
Last week, the affected people, mainly young men from Kumasi, had petitioned the Minister of Education, Science and Sports (MoESS) and the IGP to get Mr Abebrese to pay back their monies as his refusal to keep his promise was bringing untold hardship including police arrests.
According to the spokespersons, while some of the affected people, mostly traders, used a chunk of their working capital to pay for their intended trip and were now out of jobs, others had had to endure several police arrest due to their indebtedness to their creditors.
For those who had managed to raise some amount to revive their businesses, they could not travel to the neighbouring countries as they did because their passports too were being held up by SUGHA.
The spokespersons said apart from the monies the President of SUGHA took to process their travelling documents, they had to pay ???three thousand new Ghana cedis or ¢3 million??? as registering fees.
Out of that amount, which was not refundable, each person had three travelling chances.
While they were not so eager to retrieve the registering fees, their main concern now was to get their huge sums back as their desire to be part of the teeming supporters of the Black Stars in their various international matches abroad had become “one hell of a nightmare”.