After tendering in his resignation as Protocol Officer of Ghana Premier League side, Accra Hearts of Oak, Mr Joshua Acquah, has sued the club over match fixing allegations levelled against him during a premier league match.
Viral reports of Mr Acquah’s involvement with a betting company to influence matches of the former African champions to his advantage caused a major stir in the inner circles of the Ghanaian football fraternity in the wake of calls for a clamp-down on match fixing by the Ghana Football Association (GFA) and the Ghana League Clubs Association (GHALCA).
Former management member of the club, Aziz Haruna Futa, is also joined in the suit that was filed at the High Court in Accra on November 10, 2017 to prove defamatory comments made against Mr Acquah in his alleged involvement with the betting syndicate leading to his arrest by the Nima Police in Accra.
According to Aziz Haruna, the match-fixing activities of Acquah allegedly contributed to Hearts of Oak’s failure to win this season’s premier league and the reason for the club’s inconsistent results in the league.
But Mr Acquah has rubbished the assertions, claiming they were borne out of animosity and dislike for his unflinching dedication to the club.
“I have been the target of hatred, curses, death threats and insults by Hearts fans some of whom have called for my execution by stoning. This hostility has been spread on all media platforms in Ghana and abroad since management of Hearts of Oak reported me to the police on accusations of fixing the club’s matches through bribery of referees,” Mr Acquah explained in a release signed by himself yesterday.
While conceding that the club has encountered a series of inconsistent results with the latest coming from a humiliating 3-0 trouncing by rivals, Asante Kotoko, in the MTN FA Cup finals, Mr Acquah said that does not give room for people to assume that he deliberately connived to influence the results of matches.
Mr Acquah noted that “he feels proud to have had the privilege to serve his beloved club in various capacities with unflagging and unalloyed dedication and loyalty for nearly two decades. I wish to state for emphasis that bar genuine cases of misjudgement, which is to be expected, at no time in my entire stay at Accra Hearts of Oak did I deliberately act against the best interest of the club.”
“I, therefore, consider the recent decision by management of the club to make a scapegoat of me as a sad case of betrayal and monumental ingratitude. These are my preliminary comments. At the appropriate time, I will call the press for a thorough briefing about my sensitive role in Accra Hearts of Oak and the chain of events that led to my recent resignation.”
Today Sports
…with Gottlieb Baako