Ghana minister resigns after US$1 million robbery saga

Cecilia Abena Dapaah, Ghana’s Minister of Sanitation and Water Resources, has resigned after claims surfaced last week that her former aides stole over US$1 million last year from her home.

As a result, social media was awash with questions on how and why the Minister had such a huge amount of money at her home which thereafter prompted her resignation on Saturday.

“Since yesterday, Friday July 21 2023, social and traditional media have been full of stories about a Court case involving a theft that took place last year in the home I live with my husband and daughter,” said the minister.

“The stories sought to suggest that I own various huge sums of foreign currencies and millions of Ghana cedis which have been stolen from my home.

“Whereas I can state emphatically that those figures do not represent correctly what my husband and I reported to the Police, I am very much aware of the importance of such stories around someone in my position.

“I am resigning therefore, because I do not want this matter to become a preoccupation of Government and a hindrance to the work of Government at such a crucial time.

“I intend to co-operate fully with all State agencies to enable them to fully establish the facts. I have no doubt whatsoever that at the end of the processes, it will be fully established that I have conducted myself with integrity during my period in public service and I will be fully exonerated from all the allegations that have filled the public domain in the past 24 hours.” 

The Minister has since been placed under arrest by the Office of the Special Prosecutor on corruption allegations.

Meanwhile, court proceedings involving her former aides who bought houses and other assets with the money are ongoing.