Pieces of information gathered from the wide pool of friends of Kwakwo Tabiri Asenso-Okyere, otherwise known as KT, showed that he and his friends belong to the upper crust club of family and relatives of faculty members who partied very hard and had to resort to fraud to pass exams.
Other groups include those who flocked UK during vacations and turned up late for lectures which would have already been in progress, sometimes for over a month. Nothing was done to such students, showing the complete breakdown in implementation of established disciplinary codes of the University.
Chronicle learnt that KT has had a near-miss incarceration, following his alleged involvement in a robbery incident a couple of years ago. It was established that he did not appear to have such a great relationship with his father because he has married someone other than his mother, and has to rely on his stepmother who accompanied him to the Mfodwo Committee to give his damaging evidence which were recorded. He cited as many as 30 plus names of accomplices, most of whom were invited to comment with their parents and guardians.
KT and his friends all drive cars on campus, and run mobile phone businesses, travel agencies, engage in visa racketeering or sell examination papers. It is not known whether Asenso-Okyere has ever enquired from his son how he funds his expensive lifestyle of maintaining a BMW on campus.
When he appeared before the Mfodwo Committee he gave the following testimony.
He was informed panel had been put together to investigate leakages associated with last semester’s examinations. Members of the panel would ask him a few questions. He was advised to respond truthfully to the questions.
Q1. Your name …
Ans. Kwadwo Tabiri Asenso-Okyere
Q2. Where did you go to school?
Ans. Prempeh College.
Q3. What are you studying here?
Ans. Political Science, Level 400
Q4. You have the structure of an American footballer. Have they been trying to recruit you?
Ans. No.
Q5 Are you combining or majoring?
Ans. I am majoring.
Q6. Have you heard rumours of examination leakages? What is your theory?
Ans. Teaching Assistants, Lecturers, Workers in the departments, may be who work on computers could give questions especially to the ladies.
Q7. What do you think would induce students to want to secure examination questions ahead of time?
Ans. I would think those who would do that aren’t prepared for the examination.
Q8. Is it your impression that many people on campus aren’t quite prepared for their examinations.
Ans. That’s not it.
Q9 It is not so that minimizes the prospect of anybody?
Ans. Yeah, I mean that a few number of people would be doing that than those who study.
Q10. So that there seems to be too many extra-curricula activities – Hall week, SRC Week, all kinds of activities. They take too much of everybody’s time. You think that’s possible?
Ans. There is the possibility if you tend to be a part of every social activating going on.
Q11 Are you a part of every fun activity?
Ans. Not all but like Legon Hall Week, my own Hall Week.
Q12. Do you think Examination Attendants could be a source of leakage?
Ans. What I know and what I see is when we are about to write our exams
the papers are in a sealed brown envelope. What they do is to write the index numbers and then go out. They don’t really do the invigilation – they give a few assistance like fetching water for somebody to drink or… that’s what they do. I don’t think that they will get access to the papers.
Q13 From what we have heard we are beginning to think that they might be a source and we were about to recommend that we should discontinue use of the Exam Attendants anymore?
Ans. If according to your investigations you see that it leaks through that then I think you should discontinue using them.
Q14. Do you know any of them?
Ans. Yeah.
Q15. Who?
Ans. I know – not of this year – but of previous years because they happened to be either sons of staff and also stay on campus for about two years… I know a number of them but I’m, a little bit confused about the names but I was even an attendant myself after secondary school.
Q16 Oh you yourself have been an attendant?
Ans. Yes.
Q17 But you are not friends with them, are you?
Ans. I had a friend, there last year.
Q18 Who?
Ans. He’s Dela I have the other friend, he’s in Level 100 now. This is last year… that was when I was in Level 200. I know Dela and I know … They are not my age group… like when I see them I say high to them. It happens that wherever I write my exams they see me because they know me.
Q19 But you are not friends with any of them particularly not Dela?
Ans. Dela is not my friend. Dela was an attendant last year. He’s in Level 100 now and he happens to be on my floor too. We just say high and … Dela was of the quarantine section and I have been to write quite a few number of papers there last year.
Q20 Last year?
Ans. I rewrote some papers there.
Q21 Did you ask Dela for assistance?
Ans. Oh no.
Q22 He says you did…
Ans. Dela says I did
Q23 Yes. He says you did … last year
Ans. What assistance would I need?
Q24 He says you confided in him that you hadn’t prepared well for your exams so any assistance he could give you would be appreciated. And he said he gave you a paper.
Ans. Dela said he gave me a paper. I wouldn’t know why he said that.
Q.25 He just left here with his father.
Ans. I never did ask him for any assistance.
Q26. But why would he say you did? Does he have anything against you?
Ans. Not at all.
Q27 Dela had said a few things. He said that he assisted you last year and this year you requested assistance again but he’s not in a position to be an Examination Attendant because he is now a student. So you asked if he would introduce you to somebody who would be cooperative and he introduced you to Alex. Do you know Alex?
Ans. I know Alex.
Q28 What’s his name?
Ans. That’s all I know. I know his dad is a lecturer at African Studies or something. He was the Chief Invigilator there.
Q29 Back to Alex… you are not particularly friends?
Ans. No.
Q30 Did you have occasion to give Dela a mobile telephone?
Ans. Yes.
Q31 What was the occasion?
Ans. He bought it from me.
Q32 How much?
Ans. He paid … This is about a year… I don’t quite remember the amount. He added a ten pound note and some cedis – five hundred or I think he paid like seven or six something.
Q33 How much was a telephone selling? What’s the normal price?
Ans. The phone … a brand new one would be like ¢1.1m.
Q34. And you gave it to him for six hundred?
Ans. What happened was that when Dela was there I know Dela.. Dela is our church mate and I had two phones then and it happened to be a second Semester so I would be traveling and I would get a new phone so I just decided to sell the phone to him for cheap… not necessary selling it for cheap because I know him. But I wasn’t actually looking for profit because I had used the phone for over a year so I sold it to him for ...
Q35 Dela says that on the occasion that he gave you the paper you promised to do something for him and later he got the telephone from you for six hundred. In other words he got it for a discount. You dispute.
Ans. I don’t see it as a discount.
Q36 Half the price. So it’s huge discount
Ans. Because it’s an old phone. You should see the phone. That phone
is the type which …
Q37 How long have you had it?
Ans I have had it like 7 months.
Q38 Then it’s not too old. Within a year…
Ans. What happened was that when you use phones… Like you move a round a lot it happens to fall down and scratch a lot.
Q39 Anyway. Dela was grateful, thankful that the phone came to him at a discount.
Q40 Dela also says that this year you asked him for assistance and he said he couldn’t help you and you said he could introduce you to someone. So he introduced Alex to you. Have you met Alex?
Ans. No.
Q41 Never?
Ans. I know him at the quarantine centre.
Q You’ve never met Alex?
Ans. Never.
Q43 Dela says when you said he should introduce you to someone who could help he invited Alex to his room and he came with two others – Evans and Evans. Do you know them?
Ans. Yes.
Q44 Do you recall Dela. Evans and Evans coming to see you in your room? They’ve all testified.
Ans. No. That they came to my room?
Q45 Yes, They all came here with their parents. KT, what is your room number?
Ans. C41
Q46 They’ve all testified that they came to your room. They said that in their presence you discussed procuring assistance and you gave them a list of eight papers of which Alex was asking for ¢2.5 million for one and your response independently corroborated by all of them was a humorous one… why ¢2.5 million? Do you want to buy a plane? In the end you agreed that you’ll procure the papers at ¢300,000.00 each. All three of them have said this conversation did take place. Did it?
Ans. No.
Q47 They have also said, at least Alex had said that subsequently they delivered to you 4 papers and you made various payments - ¢1 million at some point, ¢500,000 and ¢200,000. The ¢500,000 was paid at the Vice-Chancellor’s Lodge. They’ve all said they shared the money - ¢800,000 to Alex, ¢800,000 to Evans and ¢100,000 to Evans. You don’t recall that?
Ans. No.
Q48 Another person who has been here is Walker. Do you know Walker?
Ans. Yes.
Q49. Did you introduce Walker to Ales?
Ans. Why would I introduce him to Alex? For what reason.
Q50. Do you go to Walker’s room sometimes?
Ans. Yes.
Q51 Where?
Ans. In West Legon, Yes.
Q52 So if you knew Alex was helping, it stands to reason that Walker also wanted assistance. You could introduce him to Alex. You didn’t do that?
Ans. No.
Q53 Anyway, all these people who have no axes to grind with you have come to tell this Committee with their parents that Dela was the original source of leakage from last year. Dela has confirmed this. When this year he couldn’t help he introduced you to Alex. Dela, Evans and Evans have said that they came to visit you in your rooms. Al of four of them did so. In your rooms you discussed about how to procure papers. Money was discussed, money has changed hands and in the process Alex was found not because Walker gave a paper to Kwafo. Kwafo did not handle the paper well so he gave Walker as his source and Walker gave you as the person who introduce him to Alex and that’s how the leakages have come about.
When you have so many people corroborating the story it is pointless to keep your position now. This University has been going for fifty years already. A lot of reputations are at risk as a result of … it’s already on the internet. Very soon if you send students abroad nobody would look at them. And it is a great pity that while your father was Vice-Chancellor that this began to happen. Let’s kill it… Let’s kill it. So many people are telling this story and they have no axe to grind with you. Your best bet is to clean out. So that we can arrest the canker. So please, help us.
At this point Mrs. Asenso-Okyere was requested to take her son out and counsel him to tell the Committee the truth. They returned after a few minutes.
MRS. ASENSO-OKYERE’S REPORT
She reported that she told her son that truth reigns supreme and once all the others had
come to say the same story he could not tell a different story. He should therefore do the
Committee a favour by confessing the truth.
KT CONTINUES
KT asked to be allow to tell the story as it occurred. He said his involvement in this whole saga started in the last semester of his third year during the 2003/2004 academic year. He happened to be quarantined. When he got there everything was like he knew Dela and he spoke to him. He was writing a first paper and somebody else was writing his second paper. Dela told him he could get him the second paper because it was an easy thing for him to do to help him.
Dela therefore managed to get him the paper. He took it to a friend and they solved the questions and things went well for him in that paper. After this he asked Dela again if he could get him other papers since he would not be quarantined throughout the examinations. There were papers that were written in the morning which he would write at 3.00 p.m.
There was another tall guy working with Dela (he is now in Level 100) through whom Dela sent him the papers. For his toils, he was giving him ¢100,000.00 a paper.
He could however not recollect the exact number of papers that he got from him that first time. But it would be at least two.
He helped another friend – George Opare Addo – a Level 400 student of Commonwealth Hall – to also get some papers – about two of them. That brought all the papers to about four or so. It was for this reason he sold the phone to him at a discount.
He passed in those papers but at the end of it all he trailed in some other papers.
Q54 Last Semester?
Ans. I met Dela (and Alex was there) but it was like he wasn’t part of it. Alex didn’t know what was going on. Later they became close and Alex was brought in.
Q55 So this last semester what happened?
Ans. I talked to Dela and Dela brought them over. We talked and he said ¢2.5 million and that was where I said whether they wanted to buy a plane.
Q56. So how much did you come to?
Ans. The papers were. It was actually – it was a 3.00 o’clock paper. If you checked the time table and you have a 3.00 o’clock paper then you know you could get that paper. So on my time table I didn’t have any 3.00 o’clock paper. So it was … I don’t know how come but some people got to know that may be I could help. I have a few close friends who had been telling me they wanted help.
Q57 So how many did you help altogether?
Ans. It was like … What happened was that … there was this paper … it wasn’t my paper… I wasn’t too much a part of it but I was in front because I didn’t write any paper…
Q58 You were a conduit? Now that you’re telling the story tell it all. Because the story is that you sell papers. That would explain why even papers that you were not writing were still coming to you. The four friends, their names… Don’t protect anybody because nobody has protected you. Their names …
Ans. Osbert.
Q59 What course is he doing?
Ans. Admin.
Q60 What is the surname?
Ans …
Q61 Which Hall?
Ans. He is in the hostel
Q62 What paper did you get for him?
Ans. He said hewanted it. Actually I didn’t get him any paper.
Q63 The four friends that you got papers for who were these?
Ans. Actually, I’m trying to … Actually… This paper… Actually I was at home… knowing that Charles Walker was my friend, people come to him and he will tell me. When he tells me then I tell him I’ll see what I can talk to them and get him… So Charles Walker, I gave him and he gave it to somebody. That is now come.
There was this girl too. It was all through Charles.
Q64 What’s the name of the girl?
Ans. I can’t remember. She was in Cape Coast too. Name Yaa or Nana Yaa
Q65 You got her question… also through Charles. Then who else?
Ans. What happens is that I give it to him and he gives to people I don’t know.
Q.66 How much do you charge Charles?
Ans. I don’t charge him. If you say charge… I give it to him… But what happens is that he will tell me this person wants this and he has this amount. It was not something that I charge.
Q67 So on the average, how much?
Ans. May be it will begin from ¢300,000 to 1 million cedis.
Q68 So it was ad hominem kind of thing. There is no price but how much you can pay. Is that it?
Ans. Unless he’s not telling me the truth. He probably brings you smaller amounts. I think that … he wouldn’t be cheating. That will be the amount he will bring to me because, some are close … the person he gave the Psychology paper to, was his mate – a junior – from Mfantsipim.
Q69 But he himself says sometimes he bought papers directly from Alex for ¢500,000.00.
Ans. So it got to a point when I thought of it and said it wasn’t doing me any good because I wasn’t getting any papers and that it is kind of time wasting. You’ll have to follow up and come and see whether you’ve got some papers so I mean … nobody should ask me for anything again. So anytime he comes to me I tell him no or nothing because it was getting widespread and people were talking about it.
All these leakages weren’t me. Most of them… most of them weren’t me…
Q70 Who were the others?
Ans. Okay. I got to find out that three days prior to a paper sometimes… Psychology papers come out.
Q71. From?
Ans I never got the name. I know those who get the papers.
Q72 Who are these? Psychology..
Ans. Like Ranger, Opare Addo. I don’t know anything about that one. What he said was that somebody approached them from the Department (Psychology) and told them he will get them the papers. But he wasn’t getting from that person. He was getting it through another person.
Q73 the somebody who approached the… Psychology… is he a student or he is working?
Ans. He is working. What I think is it wasn’t only final year papers that was coming out. It was the whole year.
Q74 In Psychology from 100 to 400?
Ans. Not from 100. From 200 because 203 came out and the papers you can go anywhere and you see the papers… like people will be printing, people will be doing this and you can see that sometimes… it wasn’t only Psychology. I think, it was other papers. It was more of Psychology. That’s what I know because those boys are my friends and they told me everything. That’s the guy approached the man they pay him ¢500,000 per paper.
Q75 That’s Ranger and Opare-Addo?
Ans. And a few other friends.
Q76 Please don’t … this is not the time to gloss over these… Who are these?
Ans. I know
Q77 What about Emeka?
Ans. I don’t know anything about him.
Q78 You don’t know Emeka?
Ans I know him but I don’t know anything about him liking to …
Q79 What about Bash? Pablo?
Ans. I don’t know Bash but Pablo is George Opare Addo.
Q80. So you know these were also sources of leakage. Your particular contact who used to be Dela but now Alex. Pablo and these others are the sources in Psychology. Are there any other sources of leakage that you have heard?
Ans. Not.
Q81 There have been leakages in the Sciences…
Ans. Science too.
Q82 Yes. Biology …
Ans. May be that would be from the Departments.
Q83 You were suggesting that sources of leakage could be young ladies. Was it just theory?
Ans. Young ladies as in what… I don’t have any fact. People always say that the lecturers will give it to the ladies.
Q84. have you heard of any lecturer who does it?
Ans. Not really.
Q85 KT you know you are very popular. Everybody calls you KT. You see if you give yourself a little bit more time to reflect over these you think that you can capture on a page the names that are the sources because there is no use going for Dela and those others. The canker will still be there. If we give you a little bit more time can you capture the names?
Ans. Of anybody I have heard? It might not be the one to get but he got it through a friend…
Q86 But we are investigating. We want to go through. Not shotcuts. Please try and … I suggest that when you leave here you go and do it immediately. Don’t discuss it with anybody because if you think you’re helping others they…. Just when you have leave here if you can go and give us the list so that tomorrow we’ll have it and we can continue because this ‘I can remember’ is not helpful. Be as candid as much as you can because when they came here they were open. They gave us everything. But let me ask you why we you doing all this?
Ans. initially it was like myself… that was in 300 when I had two papers… Dela’s time…
But this time looking through my time table I did not have any. I think I had a 3 o’clock but it was something… rather it was cool for me to write so I wasn’t doing it this semester.
Q87. But was time table your problem?
Ans. That’s what I’m saying because if it was a 3 o’clock paper I could get it in the morning.
Q88. But that’s the point. Why do you want to take advantage of current time at all? What’s the point? If you could apply yourself seriously to your work.
Ans. I study alright but I think if I see it too it will make it easier.
Q89 But the harm you’ve done, you didn’t worry about your father… the harm you’ve done.
Ans. Initially, it was me and… this… I met the guy first and it was like that… I was quarantined there.
Q90. But Pablo also met Dela?
Ans. Pablo never met Dela. He gave me the course code and I go and see Dela for the papers.
Q91. Have you had discussion with the vice-Chancellor since the rumours first broke?
Ans. It wasn’t helping me.
Q92 Why you?
Ans. ……
Q93 Because what you’ve done anybody who hears it without getting to know the details would be thinking that you were taking advantage of your father’s position to get access to these things. But as it turns out it has nothing to do with him. He doesn’t know anything. You can be a Registrar and not have access to any examination questions at all. If your son comes up for mention in this… I am just trying to find out what you thought you were going. When you’ve got yourself into all this. You’ve done so much harm already. The least you can do for reparation is to come clean… everybody. Don’t feign amnesia… I can’t recall… I don’t know and all kinds of things. Go and reflect on this matter and write out every detail you can give us.
Q94. I was asking you… have you had any discussion with the Vice-Chancellor since the rumour broke?
Ans. He told me Mr. Tabi informed him.
Q95 And after Tabe what did you tell him?
Ans. He asked me what we are talking about and I told him…
Q.96 You knew nothing about it?
Ans. Yeah.
Q97 Now, Madam you go and report to him what had transpired… It’s hard to break.
Ans. It’s just behind the quarantine centre. When you enter the Great hall the right side.
Q99. And is it true that you made one of the payments in the Vice-Chancellor’s lodge?
Ans. Yeah.
Q100 Sacrilege. Your friends do visit you in the Lodge readily.
Ans. Yeah.
Q101 And you invite them sometimes?
Ans. Yeah.
Q102 have you given us the names? You asked Alex for eight papers then later you said some of them were not playing ball. So you reduced it to four. Can you give us the names of the other four?
Ans. That was the Admin. Papers.
Q103 Do you know of Sociology paper that also leaked? Sociology 407.
Ans. Sociology… no.
Q104 But then the Sociology, you haven’t heard of problems about Sociology?
Ans. If it’s Sociology then I would think it was Walker because he wanted it for himself.
