Reasons Behind Frances Suspension

The Board of the Ghana Cylinder Manufacturing Company -GCMC has suspended CEO of the state body, Frances Essiam following a vote on Tuesday evening.
Source close to Ahafonews.com indicates that six of the nine-member board voted in favour of Frances Essiam’s suspension at a meeting held outside the premises of GCMC due to a lock-out on the orders of Frances Essiam, a situation that barred staff of the company from gaining access to their offices when they turned up for work.

The Board had reportedly queried Frances Essiam over claims that she has mismanaged GCMC, and also awarded some contracts without the approval of the Board or the Energy Ministry.

A letter from the company’s Board had warned Frances Essiam to stay off the disbursement of a GH¢5million stimulus package sought by the government for the company.

The letter titled: ‘Urgent issues for which the Board needs answers from the CEO’ dated April 13, 2018, and signed by the Board Chairman, former Effiduase-Asokore MP, Frank Boakye Agyen, questioned why Madam Essiam never sought approval from the Ministry of Energy before awarding several contracts.

“You verbally informed the Board but belatedly after you borrowed money to enable you to pay the salaries of the workers for February 2018. Please explain why you did not seek the Board’s approval before contracting the loan to pay workers” the letter said.

“….at the meeting of the board on the 5th of April 2018, members unanimously asked me to write to you to demand answers for the following actions of yours; in ordering the company’s old and disused machinery for sale as scraps, did you follow the due process laid by law? If yes, please state the processes you followed,” it added.

The board also demanded answers from the CEO about why she ordered the sale of a disused machine belonging to the company.

She was retrained by the board from touching a GHS5m stimulus package secured for the company by the government.

Source: Ahafonews