My wife abandoned me - Alhaji Abass

Alhaji Issah Abass, a businessman who was acquitted on charges of conspiracy and engaging in prohibited business relating to narcotic drugs, is grieving over the losses he has suffered for the past three years. Speaking in an interview with The Chronicle, Alhaji Abass said his wife deserted him as soon as he was charged for the drug related offences, and left for London with his three kids. "My brother, I don't know whether or not she has divorced me, but she ignored me all this while, and left with my kids."

Recounting life in jail to this journalist, he said prison was a terrible place, adding that worse of all was the transfer from one prison to the other. He intimated that his experience took him through six prisons in two years, namely the Nsawam, Yendi, Koforidua, Ankaful, Takoradi and Sunyani prisons. "Even a person who has committed murder would not be taken through this ordeal," he lamented.

Alhaji Abass noted that he met his pal Mr. Kwabena Amaning, aka Tagor, at Nsawam Prison when he was brought from Sunyani to receive medical attention at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital in Accra. Tagor was also on transfer from Yendi at the time.

He emphasized that since he has a kidney ailment, he had to be admitted at the hospital for five months, where he was operated upon to remove stones from his kidney. The businessman said what was so pathetic was that he was abandoned by the government, as a result of which he bad to pay his own medical bill, which cost him GH¢35 a day for five months he spent.

When asked why he was so appreciative of his daughter Ayishetu, he responded that she had to abandon all her activities to settle near the prisons wherever I was transferred to, in order to cook for him, since he could not eat the food that was prepared in the prison.

“I can't eat prison food, so my family had to move with me so that they could come there every day," he emphasized. Alhaji Abass was in a fix as to how he could revive his nearly collapsed businesses and his reputation. "My dignity, my businesses are totally destroyed, I just have to start all over, it is very sad," he bemoaned.

He said prior to his incarceration, he supplied car tyres to the Ghana Police Service, however, some consignments which were shipped from Italy to him were all locked up in the harbour, and were later confiscated by the state due to his incarceration and absence. He continued that a 70 seater bus that was given to him by his partners in Italy was also confiscated by the state, adding that a 40 foot container full of tyres was sold by his Accountant, who subsequently bolted away with the proceeds. "Most of my staff resigned, this was really sad, and things just fell apart, my properties were confiscated while my business was in difficulties,” he lamented. Asked how he could pay for all the bills, including his legal fees while in prison, he said his businesses would help.

Alhaji Abass concluded by sending signals of his preparedness to go to court to retrieve monies he spent on his medical bills, since those expenses should have been taken care of by the government. Source: Chronicle/Ghana