THE dispute between the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) and telecommunications giant, Milicom Ghana Limited, operators of tiGO, over the payment of the company's outstanding Business Operating Permit (BOP) levy is far from over as the AMA has threatened legal action against the company.
The Public Relations Officer of the AMA, Mr Numo Blafo III, told the Daily Graphic that the AMA would take the telecom operator to court to compel it to settle its GH¢194,000 BOP indebtedness to the assembly.
Nii Blafo III, however, added that the day of the court action was yet to be decided by the assembly.
Milicom Ghana Limited until last Thursday, owed GH¢294,000 as BOP to the AMA.
As a result, the AMA revenue collection team locked up the offices of the company's head office in Accra in an attempt to recoup the said levy.
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| The AMA boss, Alfred Vanderpuiye |
The scuffle later led to the arrest of one of the company’s security staff who was subsequently processed before the community centre court in Accra, convicted, and sentenced to six months imprisonment for obstructing a public officer from carrying out his normal duties.
Consequent to that, Mr Blafo III said Milicom Ghana Limited last Friday paid GH¢100,000 out of its total arrears to the AMA.
The company has in the meantime, secured an interlocutory injunction from a circuit court in Accra against the AMA, thus, barring the AMA or its agents from entering, locking up or otherwise interfering with its operations .
With the interlocutory injunction from Milicom, Mr Blafo III said the AMA would respond to it.
Narrating events leading to AMA storming the tiGO head office last Thursday, the PRO said the AMA had on December 10, 2010, written to Milicom Ghana Limited reminding them of their indebtedness and further gave them up to December 22, 2010 to settle their arrears.
“But the company did not comply, forcing us to go there on December 23, 2010 to retrieve our money only to be treated that way”, the PRO said.
According to him, the company’s actions towards the AMA’s revenue collection team was rude. “The attitude from management was very rude. They even ordered us out of their premises and further called for a re-enforcement of their security team. We also called in the police, which then led to the arrest of one of them”, Mr Blafo said.
The AMA, he said had on separate occasions locked up the offices of the Ghana Post and then attempted to do same to the Ghana Bar Association except that the association quickly issued cheques to defray their debts.
He thus wondered why Milicom, which operates the mobile telecommunications company, tiGO, re-opened the locked-up offices and further engaged the team in scuffles when it attempted to re-lock the place, asking “is Milicom or tiGO bigger than Ghana Post?”.
The penalty for breaking up and destroying the AMA’s pad locks, according to Mr Blafo is 10 times the original cost of the equipment used in locking up the place.
“They had destroyed nine of our pad locks, six chains and one heavy duty chain. This means that they would pay 10 times the price of each of these items” the PRO said.
But the management of Milicom Ghana Limited would rather not comment on the matter except to say “the company has no comment on the matter”.
According to a front desk officer at the tiGO’s head office in Accra, known only as Belinda, she had been instructed to tell anybody seeking management’s view on the matter that “tiGO has no comment on the matter”.
The PRO’s office line was also not answered despite several calls to get him to comment.
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